Canadian Politics Today

Beyond Politics => General Discussion => Topic started by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 12:03:20 am


Title: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 12:03:20 am
How is considering the left "self absorbed idiots" so conducive to conversation that the onus is on the left.to make that conversation happen?
A rational person can seek a compromise with people they view as idiots. A rational person cannot seek a compromise with people they view as evil. But the bigger barrier is the general attitude of people on the left that require ideological conformity to the point where it is not enough for a libertarian to agree with the left on gay rights or immigration they are still evil if they oppose higher minimum wages or affirmative action. There is much greater diversity of thought on the right than on the left and the unwillingness to accept diversity of thought on the left is why there is such an impasse.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 30, 2017, 12:23:20 am
A rational person can seek a compromise with people they view as idiots. A rational person cannot seek a compromise with people they view as evil. But the bigger barrier is the general attitude of people on the left that require ideological conformity to the point where it is not enough for a libertarian to agree with the left on gay rights or immigration they are still evil if they oppose higher minimum wages or affirmative action. There is much greater diversity of thought on the right than on the left and the unwillingness to accept diversity of thought on the left is why there is such an impasse.

If we left it to the "diversity of thought" from the right I'm afraid we would still be bashing gays and forcing our children to recite the Lord's Prayer every morning before classes started.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on August 30, 2017, 09:17:40 am
I think that things have escalated.  Not to the point of violence yet.

In response to Hurricane Harvey, seeing lots of posts hectoring Christians for not opening churches during Harvey, hectoring Oil Companies, Republicans, and Texans for denying climate change and now ostensibly experiencing the effects, as well as the "All Cities Matter" meme which tosses the criticism for Black Lives Matter back at the critics.

Seems disunifying and nasty to me.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: segnosaur on August 30, 2017, 02:25:02 pm
A rational person can seek a compromise with people they view as idiots. A rational person cannot seek a compromise with people they view as evil.
That logic can only go so far, if you are dealing with attitudes and actions that are in every way wrong.

If I say "the sky is blue" and you say "the sky is red", you don't really have much to compromise about. Similarly, if one individual says "All people should be treated equally", how exactly do you compromise on that point? "You are treated equally but only on weekdays, weekends we can still discriminate against you"? That's the way it is with things like gay marriage (opposed by religious groups).

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But the bigger barrier is the general attitude of people on the left that require ideological conformity to the point where it is not enough for a libertarian to agree with the left on gay rights or immigration they are still evil if they oppose higher minimum wages or affirmative action. There is much greater diversity of thought on the right than on the left...
No, there really isn't.

Yes, there are people on the left who have a set of core values that they think people must follow. But there are also people on the left who have no problem picking and choosing which ideas to adopt. And consider all of the Trump supporters who even attack republicans if they should speak out against some of Trump's actions.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: segnosaur on August 30, 2017, 02:44:34 pm
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Here's the thing... in the last election, the Democrats did have policies that were palatible to the people outside the big urban centers.
The policies were completely negated by the obsession with unfettered immigration...
Except of course the Democrats weren't proposing 'unfettered immigration'. They did want to reform it (and in some ways make it easier to immigrate) but it would not be a free-for-all.

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...and a clear to desire to screw over working class Americans by refusing to do anything to stop illegal immigration (e.g. supporting sanctuary cities).
But here's the thing... things like 'sanctuary cities' don't often impact rural voters. And even if there was a reason for them to be impacted by sanctuary cities, they were more likely to benefit from them (it actually lowers the crime rate, and saves money that can be better used elsewhere.)

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You can argue that the blow back against these policies is extreme at times but there would be no blow back if the democrats had taken a reasonable approach.
Actually the Democrats did have a reasonable approach in terms of policy... what they failed to do is adequately educate voters about how/why their policies were better than Trump's "Build the wall" and "Mexicans are rapists" rhetoric, which were foolish policies based on fear and ignorance.
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A better explanation is the media did not care about the extreme right. Now it has a Trump that it needs to bash it suddenly starts covering events that used to be ignored.
As I pointed out early, there have been hundreds of murders associated with those on the far right over the past decade (i.e. long before Trump became racist-in-chief.) And the Southern Poverty Law center (a group that tracks various far-right groups) has found that there has been an increase both in the number of right-wing hate groups, and the number of actual cases of violence in the past couple of years.

https://www.thenation.com/article/donald-trumps-rise-has-coincided-with-an-explosion-of-hate-groups/
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There are lots of ways to address injustices without denigrating people who do not see them as injustices. The tactic for the left has been if you think traditional marriage is important then you are a homophobe.
Probably because there is a strong correlation between being for 'traditional marriage' and homophobia.
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If you think police should try to prevent crime you are a racist.
Uhhh.... no. I'm pretty sure that everyone wants the police to prevent crime. (Well, except for maybe the anarchists.) Its how that crime is prevented that is an issue, and tactics that unfairly target one group (such as stop and frisk) are themselves racist.
 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 03:18:51 pm
This seems to be at odds with your posts on Antifa.  Also, guns can be bought.

You know as well as I do that the center of Leftist population and power are the major urban centers, most of which prohibit firearms to one degree or another, and are filled with liberals who hate the things. Rural areas, hell, everyone's got guns, and love em to pieces. How many liberals do you think have AR-15s vs conservatives? How many military and ex-military and police and ex-police are conservatives vs liberals? How many liberal survivalist and militia groups are there?

As for Antifa, they're self-righteous thugs. That's not the same thing as people with military training and strong familiarity with weapons.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 03:34:14 pm
That logic can only go so far, if you are dealing with attitudes and actions that are in every way wrong.

If I say "the sky is blue" and you say "the sky is red", you don't really have much to compromise about. Similarly, if one individual says "All people should be treated equally", how exactly do you compromise on that point? "You are treated equally but only on weekdays, weekends we can still discriminate against you"?

But the left doesn't call for equality. In equality merit would be the deciding factor in all appointments, in who gets into colleges, into who gets hired. That notion would horrify the Left. As far as personal discrimination goes (outside government), I'm ambivalent. As a Capitalist I believe the market takes care of most of this. If you don't want gay customers, well, that's fine. You'll have fewer customers and be less profitable. The profit motive will ensure lots of places like gay customers. Etc. Unless it's something which is necessary and unique - the only hotel in town, say - I'm against government sticking its nose in.

That doesn't mean I favour discrimination. It means I disagree on the importance of certain kinds of discrimination, and the freedom people ought to have to discriminate.

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That's the way it is with things like gay marriage (opposed by religious groups).

Religious groups believe marriage is a holy thing. They don't even accept civil services as legitimate. And according to their holy books men can't marry men. Their real fear of gay marriage was mainly that they would wind up being ordered to perform it in their churches/temples/mosques.

Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 03:48:25 pm
But the left doesn't call for equality. In equality merit would be the deciding factor in all appointments, in who gets into colleges, into who gets hired.

And if white men weren't biased in favour white me, that might just be possible.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 04:04:48 pm
Except of course the Democrats weren't proposing 'unfettered immigration'.
Semantics make no difference - they want make immigration easier which means it will repel those that don't believe immigration is good.

But here's the thing... things like 'sanctuary cities' don't often impact rural voters.
Encouraging illegal immigration affects all voters. Your attempt to dismiss valid concerns over to the consequences of condoning illegal behavior is a good example of the tone deaf attitudes of democrats that lead to their loss to Trump.

I'm pretty sure that everyone wants the police to prevent crime. (Well, except for maybe the anarchists.) Its how that crime is prevented that is an issue, and tactics that unfairly target one group (such as stop and frisk) are themselves racist.
If a particular minority group is responsible for a disproportionate share of the crime then many fact based enforcement measures will fall disproportionately on that group. That does not mean the enforcement measure is unreasonable.

In any case, this is not about defending any individual opinion - just to illustrate how the left views anyone who disagrees with them as evil. You are doing an excellent job of proving my point.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 04:07:48 pm
And if white men weren't biased in favour white me, that might just be possible.
Of course you have no evidence for this statement. This is just one of those things you have been told to believe so often that you don't question it.

Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on August 30, 2017, 04:10:23 pm
You know as well as I do that the center of Leftist population and power are the major urban centers, most of which prohibit firearms to one degree or another, and are filled with liberals who hate the things. Rural areas, hell, everyone's got guns, and love em to pieces. How many liberals do you think have AR-15s vs conservatives? How many military and ex-military and police and ex-police are conservatives vs liberals? How many liberal survivalist and militia groups are there?

As for Antifa, they're self-righteous thugs. That's not the same thing as people with military training and strong familiarity with weapons.

Your post seems to contradict itself.  If Antifa are thugs, and they are confronted with weapons then they will obtain weapons and fight.

None of this says what will stop the 2nd US Civil war.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 04:15:36 pm
Yes, there are people on the left who have a set of core values that they think people must follow. But there are also people on the left who have no problem picking and choosing which ideas to adopt. And consider all of the Trump supporters who even attack republicans if they should speak out against some of Trump's actions.
If that was the case then why do libertarians find themselves more frequently allying with social conservatives when they have polar opposition views on things like abortion or gay rights? If the left was more willing to tolerate people with diverse views you would see more libertarians identifying with democrats.

A good example is libertarian blogger I read told of how his efforts to promote gay marriage in Arizona:
http://www.coyoteblog.com/coyote_blog/2014/10/gay-marriage-in-az.html

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I learned a real lesson about politics from my brief involvement in this issue -- which is, don't ever become involved again.  I am still frankly reeling from the refusal of gay rights activists to work with our group because I and others involved did not hold other Left-wing opinions.  Until this time I had a fantasy that libertarians could make common cause with the Left on social issues and the Right on fiscal and commerce issues, but I saw how this was a pipe dream.

Many on the left are fundamentally totalitarian and dislike any debate on what they unilaterally decide are "core values". This makes the left a greater threat to democracy than a gaggle of idiots with Nazi flags.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 04:16:08 pm
Of course you have no evidence for this statement. This is just one of those things you have been told to believe so often that you don't question it.

https://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Columns/2014/12/05/Jobs-Report-Black-and-White-Hidden-Bias-Hiring

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/women-motherhood-penalty_us_586d69fae4b0c4be0af2c02c

https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/11/the-workforce-is-even-more-divided-by-race-than-you-think/281175/

http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2015/mar/15/jalen-ross/black-name-resume-50-percent-less-likely-get-respo/

https://rollingout.com/2011/07/11/employers-prefer-white-felons-over-blacks-with-no-criminal-record-so-how-will-blacks-feed-their-families/

http://www.diversityinc.com/diversity-management/if-diversity-inclusion-is-working-why-are-white-men-still-getting-the-best-jobs/

Anyway
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 04:18:34 pm
Many on the left are fundamentally totalitarian and dislike any debate on what they unilaterally decide are "core values".

Well, yes.  Some debates are over.  We don't need to debate the merits of the theory of evolution.  We don't need to debate fundamental human rights, including things like gay and trans rights.  We don't need to debate global warming. 

Debating those things as if they're debatable is more closed minded than considering them settled.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on August 30, 2017, 04:20:18 pm
Many on the left are fundamentally totalitarian and dislike any debate on what they unilaterally decide are "core values". This makes the left a greater threat to democracy than a gaggle of idiots with Nazi flags.

I'm still not following this logic.  How are Nazis willing to compromise their 'core values' exactly ?  How do you debate that whites are superior, logically, and get anywhere ?

...core values fights are what started both US civil wars....
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 04:23:41 pm
https://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Columns/2014/12/05/Jobs-Report-Black-and-White-Hidden-Bias-Hiring
I looked at the links that do not provide any evidence to support your claim (hint differences in work force participation do not establish evidence of racism). You simply assumed it does because you want to believe that to be true.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 04:33:18 pm
Well, yes.  Some debates are over.  We don't need to debate the merits of the theory of evolution.  We don't need to debate fundamental human rights, including things like gay and trans rights.  We don't need to debate global warming.
Actually we do.   It is left who unilaterally decided they should not be debated. Specifically:

1) Respecting the right of trans people to dress how they want does not automatically mean society should encourage radical surgeries for mentally ill people. I personally find it unethical to normalize such surgeries and consider anyone who suggests that it should be an option for a child to be a child abuser.

2) Global warming may be a fact but the question about what to do about it, if anything, needs to be debated. The economic case for radical CO2 reduction measures is non existent and people insisting on them are doing so because they are religious zealots who are no different from the people insisting that evolution is false.

But you are proving my point: the left is unable to accept a diversity of ideas and framing their opinions is 'non-negotiable truths' is simply the one of things that people on the left do to rationalize their closed minds.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 30, 2017, 04:43:49 pm
Actually we do.   It is left who unilaterally decided they should not be debated. Specifically:

1) Respecting the right of trans people to dress how they want does not automatically mean society should encourage radical surgeries for mentally ill people. I personally find it unethical to normalize such surgeries and consider anyone who suggests that it should be an option for a child to be a child abuser.

2) Global warming may be a fact but the question about what to do about it, if anything, needs to be debated. The economic case for radical CO2 reduction measures is non existent and people insisting on them are doing so because they are religious zealots who are no different from the people insisting that evolution is false.

But you are proving my point: the left is unable to accept a diversity of ideas and framing their opinions is 'non-negotiable truths' is simply the one of things that people on the left do to rationalize their closed minds.

1. I assume by your comment you think transgender people are mentally ill? Now there's some alt.right ideology if I ever heard it.


2. Global warming has been debated at length for years. And the people who have arrived at the conclusions that are important are not religious zealots (who might well think of trans people as mentally ill) they are trained scientists.

Your first two comments completely belie your first two I'm afraid.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 04:54:15 pm
I looked at the links that do not provide any evidence to support your claim (hint differences in work force participation do not establish evidence of racism)

There was more than that there - you didn't look at all the links.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 04:56:02 pm
But you are proving my point: the left is unable to accept a diversity of ideas and framing their opinions is 'non-negotiable truths' is simply the one of things that people on the left do to rationalize their closed minds.

Some things are non negotiable truths.  It doesn't matter how 'diverse' the opinions are.  Opinions are irrelevant in the face of actual data.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 04:59:26 pm
For example - science today (both the AMA and APA have this position) recognizes gender dysphoria as a medical condition, and not a mental one.  That's not open for debate.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 05:01:00 pm
Some things are non negotiable truths.  It doesn't matter how 'diverse' the opinions are.  Opinions are irrelevant in the face of actual data.
Except you did not give example of facts - you only provided opinions. This is another fallacy that the left constantly engages in: claim their opinions are facts and then say they "can't debate facts". Learn the difference between a fact and an opinion.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Queefer Sutherland on August 30, 2017, 05:13:38 pm
"Self absorbed idiots" don't usually work to extend equal rights to people who are different than themselves, such as skin color, sexual orientation, religious beliefs etc. etc. The right should get their heads out of the sand.

The left does this because in their minds they fight for the oppressed against the more powerful oppressors.  But many people on the left have a very self-righteous view of their own morality, where if you somewhat disagree with their fundamental moral stances you are immediately labeled & completely written off as a racist/homophobe/Islamophobe  etc & then publicly shamed for it.  I know this because I leaned more leftwing than I do now for most of my adult-life so I can look back & realize I've done this & still catch myself doing it.

Now, sometimes you might be a racist/homophobe etc, but sometimes you aren't & just disagree on a particular point & then are falsely labelled such in order to shut down discussion of all who disagree.  This causes those who disagree (especially if you're white, straight, CIS, and/or male etc. aka not among the oppressed group) to fear publicly disagreeing so as not be labeled a racist etc., which people regard as a terrible rep to have.  This is an increasing tactic of the left, I don't agree with it but it's extremely effective, & in the war of ideas it's tactically brilliant.

How the left is "self-absorbed" is also that they empathize with the oppressed groups they sympathize with, but they don't bother ever empathizing with the people they disagree with.  The right is guilty of this too. Each side views the world with fundamentally opposed moral perspectives & each fails to understand how their rivals could think the way they do without being evil naive ignorant idiots.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 05:14:29 pm
For example - science today (both the AMA and APA have this position) recognizes gender dysphoria as a medical condition, and not a mental one.  That's not open for debate.
*roll eyes* as if the distinction has any meaning. If someone is so messed up that they feel they need to mutilate their body then they have a serious illness. That does not imply that everyone claiming to be trans is mentally ill. Just the people seeking surgical mutilation. Trying to argue otherwise is like saying the sky is purple. Politically correct pronouncements by professional bodies looking to avoid conflict with activists do not change anything.

That said: again another example of the closed minded zealotry that underpins many on the left. Someone interested in a rational discussion on the topic would concede my point and talk about the discrimination faced by trans who do not seek surgery. But an unwillingness to engage with people who have a different opinion is why Trump was able to win.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 30, 2017, 05:23:10 pm
*roll eyes* as if the distinction has any meaning. If someone is so messed up that they feel they need to mutilate their body then they have a serious illness. That does not imply that everyone claiming to be trans is mentally ill. Just the people seeking surgical mutilation. Trying to argue otherwise is like saying the sky is purple. Politically correct pronouncements by professional bodies looking to avoid conflict with activists do not change anything.

That said: again another example of the closed minded zealotry that underpins many on the left. Someone interested in a rational discussion on the topic would concede my point and talk about the discrimination faced by trans who do not seek surgery. But an unwillingness to engage with people who have a different opinion is why Trump was able to win.

So one must conclude you assume Jews to be mentally ill as well since they like to cut the foreskins off their male babies.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 05:25:59 pm
So one must conclude you assume Jews to be mentally ill as well since they like to cut the foreskins off their male babies.
https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/151/Reductio-ad-Absurdum
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 05:28:38 pm
This is an increasing tactic of the left, I don't agree with it but it's extremely effective, & in the war of ideas it's tactically brilliant.
It works until people stop caring about the labels which is happening now.
By lumping real racists in with people who have more nuanced non-racist opinions the left is normalizing the real racists.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 30, 2017, 05:31:07 pm
https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/151/Reductio-ad-Absurdum

Ah OK, now I see where the structure of your posts emanates from.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 06:02:02 pm
And if white men weren't biased in favour white me, that might just be possible.

You think white men are more biased in favour of hiring their own than Black or Brown men or women? Muslims or Jews or Hindus?

If you do, why? If not, why say it?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 06:04:07 pm
Your post seems to contradict itself.  If Antifa are thugs, and they are confronted with weapons then they will obtain weapons and fight.

None of this says what will stop the 2nd US Civil war.

I didn't say it would. I said it would be short. Antifa will get slaughtered. "Getting" weapons is not the same thing as knowing how to use them.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on August 30, 2017, 06:08:11 pm
I didn't say it would. I said it would be short. Antifa will get slaughtered. "Getting" weapons is not the same thing as knowing how to use them.

Would that stop the violence ?  One side getting killed by the others ?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 06:12:02 pm
Anyway

You do know the high school dropout rate for Blacks is three times what it is for Whites, right?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on August 30, 2017, 06:12:41 pm
I didn't read all of this but it's about tracking down opponents.

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/7xxmad/the-alt-right-and-antifa-are-waging-a-new-kind-of-internet-warfare?utm_source=vicefbus

You really wouldn't need much firepower to murder a political opponent by taking them by surprise, so targeted assassinations could be next.

Am I convincing anybody that this is real yet ?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 06:23:26 pm
Well, yes.  Some debates are over.  We don't need to debate the merits of the theory of evolution.  We don't need to debate fundamental human rights, including things like gay and trans rights.  We don't need to debate global warming. 

Debating those things as if they're debatable is more closed minded than considering them settled.

Settled? You think global warming is settled? What are we going to do about it? Don't say carbon taxes. Even if they worked (at MASSIVE cost) the effect would be virtually insignificant.

Human rights? I'm all for human rights. The ones like freedom of speech, religion, assembly, etc (you know, the ones so much of the Left hates). Some of the new ones aren't human rights. The Left has turned them into human rights. It's not a human right to be addressed by whatever made-up pronoun you desire. It's not a human right to undress and wag your wiener in a room full of ten year old girls. It's not a human right to be free of being offended or insulted, or having your religious values questioned. It's not and should not be a human right to have the government take care of all your needs. I even hear some idiots saying access to high speed internet is a human right. The idiots on the supreme court said, a few years ago, that the federal government was violating peoples rights if it tried to close down a clinic where they used illegal narcotics. Yes, using illegal narcotics is now a human right!

Not freedom of speech, though, or at least, not for people the Left doesn't like.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 06:24:29 pm
Except you did not give example of facts

There were several studies cited in those links.  See, that's the kind of thing that's not open for debate.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 06:25:20 pm
You think white men are more biased in favour of hiring their own than Black or Brown men or women? Muslims or Jews or Hindus?

If you do, why? If not, why say it?

Every study but one has shown what I said to be the case.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 06:25:48 pm
Would that stop the violence ?  One side getting killed by the others ?

Inevitably.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 06:26:09 pm
Every study but one has shown what I said to be the case.

You didn't answer my question.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 06:28:14 pm
Settled? You think global warming is settled? What are we going to do about it? Don't say carbon taxes. Even if they worked (at MASSIVE cost) the effect would be virtually insignificant.

Carbon taxes actually do work.  To have the needed effect (because AGW is settled), they would have to be something like $289 a ton.  That's why you need a combination of factors - conservation, energy efficiency improvements, coal phase out, oil phase out, carbon taxes, reforestation, carbon sequestration, etc.

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Human rights? I'm all for human rights. The ones like freedom of speech, religion, assembly, etc (you know, the ones so much of the Left hates). Some of the new ones aren't human rights.

Sure they are - you just haven't kept up with progress.

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Not freedom of speech, though, or at least, not for people the Left doesn't like.

Speech should be free - but everything has limits.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 06:28:49 pm
You didn't answer my question.

I think that, because it's the case.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on August 30, 2017, 06:29:31 pm
Inevitably.

I don't see this happening so cleanly.  Maybe, but not likely.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 30, 2017, 06:48:28 pm
Inevitably.

History has proven that wrong soooo many times.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 06:59:31 pm
Carbon taxes actually do work.  To have the needed effect (because AGW is settled), they would have to be something like $289 a ton.

In other words they don't work. Saying something would work if we were willing to massively curtail our standard of living is not the same as saying they will work. Besides, which, all a high carbon tax does is push carbon intensive industries to regimes which have no tax, thus incentivizing them to have no carbon tax.

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Sure they are - you just haven't kept up with progress.

No, not everything you think would be nice is a human right. It is not a human right to sit on your ass and do nothing and have me feed, cloth and shelter you.

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Speech should be free - but everything has limits.

Really? And who gets to set the limits? You? Progressives? Because we've already seen that to progressives, the only speech they feel should be protected is theirs.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 06:59:53 pm
History has proven that wrong soooo many times.

Name one.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 07:01:32 pm
I think that, because it's the case.

So you won't answer the question. Noted. Here's another. If it's wrong for a hiring manager to discriminate because he feels that's best for his company, why is it right to discriminate because progressives  feel it's best for society?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 07:06:04 pm
There were several studies cited in those links.  See, that's the kind of thing that's not open for debate.
The studies presented the facts regarding the differential. There were no facts regarding the reason for the differential - only opinions. Opinions are always a matter for debate. As I said, you need to stop pretending opinions that you like are facts.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 30, 2017, 07:06:28 pm
Name one.

Oh, Nazism would be a fairly obvious start. They got pretty well whooped 70 years ago...do you think they don't exist anymore?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 07:08:47 pm
Speech should be free - but everything has limits.
But that is the point. Rights often come into conflict and it is necessary to prioritize rights. The problem with the left is they seem to think that the priorities that they think are important are absolute truths when the are really nothing but a reflection of ideology.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 07:15:28 pm
The studies presented the facts regarding the differential. There were no facts regarding the reason for the differential

Ahh, so it's just a coincidence, then.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 07:15:56 pm
But that is the point. Rights often come into conflict and it is necessary to prioritize rights. The problem with the left is they seem to think that the priorities that they think are important are absolute truths when the are really nothing but a reflection of ideology.

How is that any different than people on the right?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 07:17:40 pm
No, not everything you think would be nice is a human right. It is not a human right to sit on your ass and do nothing and have me feed, cloth and shelter you.

You are no more the arbiter of that than I am - there are people far better place to decide these things, and they've made those decisions.
 People have the right to not be discriminated against.

Quote
Really? And who gets to set the limits? You? Progressives? Because we've already seen that to progressives, the only speech they feel should be protected is theirs.

That's why we have representative democracy, a written document of constitutional rights, and courts of law.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 07:18:04 pm
Oh, Nazism would be a fairly obvious start. They got pretty well whooped 70 years ago...do you think they don't exist anymore?

The German Nazi party got whipped and everyone of any major importance in it was executed. Germany today is most definitely not Nazi any  more. So yes, it worked.

Your standard seems to be that if a bear attacks you and you kill it, well, you haven't really settled the matter just because you live to a rope old age and die in your sleep. After all, there are still bears.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 07:22:07 pm
You are no more the arbiter of that than I am - there are people far better place to decide these things, and they've made those decisions.
 People have the right to not be discriminated against.

It might be a law that you can't discriminate against someone for certain reasons -although we all discriminate against people constantly for other reasons -  but that does not make it a human right. Short people get discriminated against. Is that a human right problem? So do fat people. So do ugly people, people with glasses and people with unpleasant skin conditions.

Quote
That's why we have representative democracy, a written document of constitutional rights, and courts of law.

Right, but then the whole question of this thread relates to just how representative that democracy is, and who might be getting angry because they think it's not representing them, doesn't it?

And to answer one of MHs question, left wingers saying "This is the way it is because I say it is." is not something likely to sooth the anger of those people who feel left out.

Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 07:35:17 pm
How is that any different than people on the right?
The right is more willing to accommodate a much greater diversity of opinion. The right does not argue that the left should be prevented from expressing their opinions.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 30, 2017, 07:36:40 pm
The German Nazi party got whipped and everyone of any major importance in it was executed. Germany today is most definitely not Nazi any  more. So yes, it worked.

Your standard seems to be that if a bear attacks you and you kill it, well, you haven't really settled the matter just because you live to a rope old age and die in your sleep. After all, there are still bears.

Ah no. If we continue to use your simple little standard then if we killed all the bears, I should never have to worry about bears again. Charlottesville is probably the most recent example of where that falls apart. But certainly not the only one.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 07:39:08 pm
Ah no. If we continue to use your simple little standard then if we killed all the bears, I should never have to worry about bears again. Charlottesville is probably the most recent example of where that falls apart. But certainly not the only one.

Did all Germans need to get killed to end Nazi rule and the threat of it? No. Just most of the Nazis. Do all people except the right need to be killed in MHs theoretical civil war question? No, just the extreme left. Most of the rest of the Left would  likely wind up spending this civil war hiding and hoping no one came for them.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: wilber on August 30, 2017, 07:41:27 pm
Of course you have no evidence for this statement. This is just one of those things you have been told to believe so often that you don't question it.

What do you think white nationalism is all about? What do you think the Nazis and KKK stand for?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 07:45:00 pm
What do you think white nationalism is all about? What do you think the Nazis and KKK stand for?
Reducto ad Absurdum. Nazis/KKK today are powerless clowns that have miniscule support. We only hear about the small number of people because the left wants an excuse to suppress all right wing opinion that they do not agree with. I have lost track of the number of times some left wing ideologue has demanded that anyone who expresses any variation from the left wing AGW agenda to be blocked from accessing media (the attacks on Roger Pielke Jr joing 538.com are textbook example).
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Queefer Sutherland on August 30, 2017, 07:45:43 pm
There is much greater diversity of thought on the right than on the left and the unwillingness to accept diversity of thought on the left is why there is such an impasse.

That's hard to say.  On the left you have your typical left-of-centers (Chretien, Obama), your further-left identity politics lefties (ie: college kids), leftist anarchists, communists, social democrats ie: Bernie Sanders/NDP etc

On the right you have classic conservatives (smaller gov, fiscal conservative, individual liberty), social & religious conservatives, cultural conservatives/nationalists, neocons, libertarians, fascists.

But you're right the left often doesn't accept much diversity of thought because the antithesis of their moral positions = evil to them, so evil it must not be allowed to exist.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 07:48:47 pm
But you're right the left often doesn't accept much diversity of thought because the antithesis of their moral positions = evil to them, so evil it must not be allowed to exist.
Which pretty much summarizes my point on this thread. How someone characterizes their opponents affects how they treat their opponents and the biggest problem in society today is how the left treats people that disagree with them. It is not a few clowns with Nazi flags.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: wilber on August 30, 2017, 07:49:43 pm
Reducto ad Absurdum. Nazis/KKK today are powerless clowns that have miniscule support. We only hear about the small number of people because the left wants an excuse to suppress all right wing opinion that they do not agree with. I have lost track of the number of times some left wing ideologue has demanded that anyone who expresses any variation from the left wing AGW agenda to be blocked from accessing media (the attacks on Roger Pielke Jr joing 538.com are textbook example).

Trump said "very fine people" were marching with them in Charlotteville.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 30, 2017, 07:51:00 pm
Did all Germans need to get killed to end Nazi rule and the threat of it? No. Just most of the Nazis. Do all people except the right need to be killed in MHs theoretical civil war question? No, just the extreme left. Most of the rest of the Left would  likely wind up spending this civil war hiding and hoping no one came for them.

Oh I don't know...I suspect if it came to a civil war the left would rise up just as the did in WWII, hopefully as successfully, but hopefully it never comes to that.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 07:52:53 pm
Trump said "very fine people" were marching with them in Charlotteville.
Trump (as usual) spoke from ignorance. The left spends so much time calling people racist that anyone who did not pay attention to what was said in Charlotteville could reasonably assume this was another example of left wing idiots calling people racist for disagreeing with them. Once the nature of the Charlotteville protest became clear no one supported them, although, Trump continued to spout nonsense I think incompetence is a better explanation.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 07:55:35 pm
What do you think white nationalism is all about? What do you think the Nazis and KKK stand for?

There's very, very, very few white nationalists. Certainly not enough to have a civil war.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 07:57:16 pm
The right is more willing to accommodate a much greater diversity of opinion. The right does not argue that the left should be prevented from expressing their opinions.

Sure they do - all the time.  They shout people down by calling them Marxists, or socialists, or communists.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 07:58:16 pm
Oh I don't know...I suspect if it came to a civil war the left would rise up just as the did in WWII, hopefully as successfully, but hopefully it never comes to that.

You think lots of ordinary  people are going to be willing to fight and risk death so that guys with penises can undress with little girls and be addressed by whatever made-up pronoun they want?

Here's an example of the distance between the far left and the rest. The far left is zealous about removing civil war statues, plagues and remembrances.
But the polls say they're largely alone in that. Most Americans are content to leave them in place. Even Blacks only want them removed by 44-40% The far left's willingness to commit violence on the issue is not supported by anyone else.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Queefer Sutherland on August 30, 2017, 07:58:40 pm
.Uhhh.... no. I'm pretty sure that everyone wants the police to prevent crime. (Well, except for maybe the anarchists.) Its how that crime is prevented that is an issue, and tactics that unfairly target one group (such as stop and frisk) are themselves racist.

Well, reasonable people on the left believe what you're saying.  There's more radical elements now on the left (some people in Black Lives Matter etc) who feel that the very fact that there's a highly disproportionate amount black people arrested & jailed for crimes is caused by racist bias by police & justice system, when actually yes there are biases but black people also do statistically commit more crimes than the average, due to poverty & other factors.

It's like saying police/judges are biased against men because there's far more men charged/jailed for crimes. Well that could be a factor, but it's seems clear that men statistically commit more crimes than women.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 07:59:42 pm
Sure they do - all the time.  They shout people down by calling them Marxists, or socialists, or communists.

Cites, please. Let's see the long list of Left wing gatherings, meetings, speeches, panel discussions and demonstrations that were broken up by the Right.

A comedy club wanted to hold a 'free speech comedy' night in Toronto, and just cancelled it for fear of violence from the Left. LOL.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 08:00:17 pm
Right, but then the whole question of this thread relates to just how representative that democracy is, and who might be getting angry because they think it's not representing them, doesn't it?

People feel the way they do because they don't understand the way things actually work or are, or they fear things that actually don't threaten them because they were told to.  I dismiss it out of hand, because that's the consideration it deserves.

Quote
And to answer one of MHs question, left wingers saying "This is the way it is because I say it is." is not something likely to sooth the anger of those people who feel left out.

No - it's not because I say it.  It's because experts have often determined these things using scientific methods.  Constitutional scholars have interpreted it from a far more learned position than I.  I choose to trust people that know more than me, because that seems to be the smarter thing to do.  The right feels differently.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 08:01:10 pm
Cites, please.

I will - as soon as you find a cite about the right being more open to free speech.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 08:01:51 pm
Sure they do - all the time.  They shout people down by calling them Marxists, or socialists, or communists.
When has someone on the right said someone should charged with crime for expressing their "Marxist" opinions? The left does it every time it accuses someone of hate speech for expressing opinions immigration or crime they disagree with? When has someone on the right argued that media outlets should not air the opinions people with "marxist" views? The left does it all the time when they label skeptics as "deniers".
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 08:07:21 pm
The skeptics are deniers.

The left doesn't preach a lot of hate, and so not a lot of actual illegal speech.  The right - different story.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Queefer Sutherland on August 30, 2017, 08:10:38 pm
It works until people stop caring about the labels which is happening now.
By lumping real racists in with people who have more nuanced non-racist opinions the left is normalizing the real racists.

I think to an extent that's true.  But the tactic still works to keep dissenters afraid, unless you can disarm them with logic.

What you're saying reminds me of other recent tactics of the identity politics leftists.  They're so quick to label anyone a "white supremacist", so it reduces the meaning of that very serious word.  They'll also say that certain words are "violent" in order to sensationalize their point, which reduces the value of that word & real physical violence.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 30, 2017, 08:10:57 pm
You think lots of ordinary  people are going to be willing to fight and risk death so that guys with penises can undress with little girls and be addressed by whatever made-up pronoun they want?

Here's an example of the distance between the far left and the rest. The far left is zealous about removing civil war statues, plagues and remembrances.
But the polls say they're largely alone in that. Most Americans are content to leave them in place. Even Blacks only want them removed by 44-40% The far left's willingness to commit violence on the issue is not supported by anyone else.

Well I'm not sure about your polls as they are often questionable, but in any case, civil war statues, such as the one in VA. are generally not intended to be "removed", but simply to be "moved" to a more appropriate location. Perhaps you don't get why a symbol of racism/slavery
might be better placed somewhere other than the towns square.

The far right's willingness to commit violence on the issue was certainly demonstrated in Charloteville.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: BC_cheque on August 30, 2017, 08:14:36 pm
That's hard to say.  On the left you have your typical left-of-centers (Chretien, Obama), your further-left identity politics lefties (ie: college kids), leftist anarchists, communists, social democrats ie: Bernie Sanders/NDP etc

On the right you have classic conservatives (smaller gov, fiscal conservative, individual liberty), social & religious conservatives, cultural conservatives/nationalists, neocons, libertarians, fascists.

But you're right the left often doesn't accept much diversity of thought because the antithesis of their moral positions = evil to them, so evil it must not be allowed to exist.

And you think the conservative cohorts are more open minded to varying opinions?

You've got to be kidding. They'll cut their nose to spite their face if it means going against 'libtards'.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 08:19:21 pm
I will - as soon as you find a cite about the right being more open to free speech.

Well, I can provide you lots of cites showing Lefties shutting down and attacking conservative speakers, panelists, demonstrations, meetings, etc. I'm sure you can provide the reverse.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 08:20:37 pm
And you think the conservative cohorts are more open minded to varying opinions?

You've got to be kidding. They'll cut their nose to spite their face if it means going against 'libtards'.

Not talking about the far right. Not even talking about the Republican Party, which does not represent ordinary people of any persuasion.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 08:23:15 pm
Well I'm not sure about your polls as they are often questionable, but in any case, civil war statues, such as the one in VA. are generally not intended to be "removed", but simply to be "moved" to a more appropriate location. Perhaps you don't get why a symbol of racism/slavery
might be better placed somewhere other than the towns square.

Perhaps 40% of Blacks don't get it either. Maybe you could go down there and explain that's for their own good you're fighting the good fight. I'm sure they'd bob their head and thank you from the bottom of their hearts.

Quote
The far right's willingness to commit violence on the issue was certainly demonstrated in Charloteville.

No, the far right's willingness to commit violence against the far left was certainly demonstrated in Charlottesville (and vice versa). Nothing more.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 08:23:54 pm
Well, I can provide you lots of cites showing Lefties shutting down and attacking conservative speakers, panelists, demonstrations, meetings, etc. I'm sure you can provide the reverse.

Those attacking don't represent the majority of the left, and more than the Nazis represent the majority of the right.  They're militant anarchists.  The ones protesting are doing just that - protesting.  That's just as protected as free speech.  They certainly didn't go armed, like many on the right (not only the Nazis) in Charlottesville.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Queefer Sutherland on August 30, 2017, 08:29:22 pm
Which pretty much summarizes my point on this thread. How someone characterizes their opponents affects how they treat their opponents and the biggest problem in society today is how the left treats people that disagree with them. It is not a few clowns with Nazi flags.

I don't know if it's the biggest problem or not but it's certainly a huge problem.

But it's not just a few clowns with Nazi flags that creating problems on the right too.  Racism & xenophobia seems to be ramping up too, to the point where mosques are being vandalized, but also to where someone like Trump can be elected.  I know lots of right-leaning older folks in my family who are otherwise wonderful people but are damned ignorant racists, & have had minimal exposure to people of other ethnicites.

I think the biggest problem goes back to my original reply to this thread, where demographic changes in western countries is creating deep ideological polarization on both left & right. 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 08:49:59 pm
Those attacking don't represent the majority of the left, and more than the Nazis represent the majority of the right.  They're militant anarchists.  The ones protesting are doing just that - protesting.  That's just as protected as free speech.  They certainly didn't go armed, like many on the right (not only the Nazis) in Charlottesville.

The far left goes armed as much as the far right. Witness what happened in Berkeley on the weekend. Protesting is free speech, yes. Protesting which involves forcing your way into a meeting or speech, shouting and chanting continuously, jumping up on stage to grab the microphone, blowing air horns and whistles, pulling fire alarms - not free speech.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 30, 2017, 08:52:12 pm
I don't know if it's the biggest problem or not but it's certainly a huge problem.

But it's not just a few clowns with Nazi flags that creating problems on the right too.  Racism & xenophobia seems to be ramping up too, to the point where mosques are being vandalized, but also to where someone like Trump can be elected.  I know lots of right-leaning older folks in my family who are otherwise wonderful people but are damned ignorant racists, & have had minimal exposure to people of other ethnicites.

I think the biggest problem goes back to my original reply to this thread, where demographic changes in western countries is creating deep ideological polarization on both left & right.

And goes back to a post I made where the cite pointed out that as long as the change is controlled and has set rules (ie, immigration) most people will be okay with it. Right now a lot of people on the right don't think immigration is controlled or has rules that make any sense. Including me.

And my problem isn't minimal exposure to other ethnicities, it's too much. I spent twenty years living in a riding which has Canada's highest concentration of Muslims.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 30, 2017, 09:03:24 pm
And goes back to a post I made where the cite pointed out that as long as the change is controlled and has set rules (ie, immigration) most people will be okay with it. Right now a lot of people on the right don't think immigration is controlled or has rules that make any sense. Including me.

Some of the toughest immigration rules of any western country as I think has already been pointed. Do you not understand, or simply ignore them to suit your purpose?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 09:44:08 pm
The far left goes armed as much as the far right.

Riiight.  The far left don't even own firearms.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 09:45:30 pm
The skeptics are deniers.
You are making my argument for me: the left is intolerant of ideas that they disagree with and actively seek to suppress them.

Your complete lack of self awareness is typical.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 09:54:23 pm
You are making my argument for me: the left is intolerant of ideas that they disagree with and actively seek to suppress them.

Your complete lack of self awareness is typical.

Skepticism in the face of evidence is completely unreasonable.  You can't be, for example, an AGW skeptic, and have me respect your opinion.  I used to be an AGW skeptic. 

Skepticism may be healthy at times, but it's completely irrational at others.  In such cases, the skeptic is the one with the closed mind.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 30, 2017, 10:08:24 pm
You are making my argument for me: the left is intolerant of ideas that they disagree with and actively seek to suppress them.

Your complete lack of self awareness is typical.

Let me ask you just a fairly simple question: who do you think has done more to advance human rights in our world, the people who fought to keep slavery, or those who fought to get rid of it? 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Queefer Sutherland on August 30, 2017, 10:36:21 pm
And goes back to a post I made where the cite pointed out that as long as the change is controlled and has set rules (ie, immigration) most people will be okay with it. Right now a lot of people on the right don't think immigration is controlled or has rules that make any sense. Including me.

The rules are probably stricter in many ways than you think they are, but in other ways I think they should be much more strict.

I also think we should be integrating immigrants much more into Canadian society & culture instead of everyone staying in their own silos.  For one, we should be teaching Canadian history much more in our K-12 levels.  I recently spoke to a friend who is the child of immigrants 1st gen Canadian who has recently graduated university with excellent parts & they know nothing about Sir John A MacDonald besides he was our 1st PM, didn't even know he was a drunk lol! We know more about US history than our own, which is pathetic.  We should all feel as part of one nationhood & have a common sense of cultural belonging that relates us all together even if we also have our cultural differences as well.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on August 30, 2017, 10:51:46 pm
And goes back to a post I made where the cite pointed out that as long as the change is controlled and has set rules (ie, immigration) most people will be okay with it. Right now a lot of people on the right don't think immigration is controlled or has rules that make any sense. Including me.

You reject the information taken directly from CIC demonstrating that immigration is controlled and has rules, and that much of what you are claiming to be true isn't actually true.  But somehow, this lack of understanding and acceptance on your part is the fault of the 'left' for not listening to your concerns?   




Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 10:54:36 pm
Let me ask you just a fairly simple question: who do you think has done more to advance human rights in our world, the people who fought to keep slavery, or those who fought to get rid of it?
Bad example. It was republicans who fought to eliminate slavery - it was democrats that fought to keep it.

But the paste is not relevant. What matters is today and today the left's intolerance towards opinions they disagree with is the greatest threat to democracy today because it undermines free speech and without free speech you can't have a democracy.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on August 30, 2017, 10:58:34 pm
Bad example. It was republicans who fought to eliminate slavery - it was democrats that fought to keep it.

But the paste is not relevant. What matters is today and today the left's intolerance towards opinions they disagree with is the greatest threat to democracy today because it undermines free speech and without free speech you can't have a democracy.

I don't think it's a matter of political parties, but rather of mindset.  Progressives work toward progressing people's rights; conservatives work to keep the status quo, even if it means some people lack some rights.  At that time, perhaps the Republicans were the 'progressive' party, and the Democrats were the 'naysayers'.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 30, 2017, 11:01:44 pm
Bad example. It was republicans who fought to eliminate slavery - it was democrats that fought to keep it.

But the paste is not relevant. What matters is today and today the left's intolerance towards opinions they disagree with is the greatest threat to democracy today because it undermines free speech and without free speech you can't have a democracy.

Check out who Robert E. Lee was and then get back to us with how tolerant you think the people are who came with Nazi flags and AR-15's to stop his statue from being relocated so that people who's forefathers were slaves could be spared having to walk by it on their way to work.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 11:03:47 pm
Skepticism in the face of evidence is completely unreasonable.
What evidence are you referring to? The basic physics that shows that CO2 is GHG and will cause warming? Well most skeptics agree with than point. The "evidence" from computer models which predicted way more warming than has actually occurred? Not all evidence is equal and discussing which evidence is compelling and which is not is a valid topic for conversation. More importantly, even if the "evidence" is treated as reliable it does not automatically follow that aggressive CO2 reduction policies are the best choice because such policies come with a cost that could easily be greater than cost of warming - especially when the models used to predict the costs of warming are economic models which are notoriously unreliable.

Sorry, the only people who deserve no respect are the people who unilaterally decided that no more discussion is allowed and dissenters must be silenced.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on August 30, 2017, 11:04:32 pm
It will get worse until white people come to grips with the fact that (unless birth rates increase substantially, which is very unlikely) caucasians will become an ethnic minority in the US by 2044.  Non-white babies are already the majority in the US.  I'm sure the #'s are similar if not higher in Canada.

Even if white nationalists wanted to stop immigration I can't think of a way it could happen without the US population shrinking.  Western countries are going to become a cosmopolitan-like mix of many different cultures/races, lots of inter-marrying etc.  It reminds me of Coruscant from the Star Wars prequels.  Maybe this is the start of the concept of "race" becoming irrelevant with this kind of globalization, races mix & in the long term most of us in the west will have light-brown skin.

Here's a very interesting convo.  Is this dichotomy the future of American politics?:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0T4jssO9t-0 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0T4jssO9t-0)

It was an interesting conversation.  I could see where the White guy was coming from in his arguments, but it certainly didn't resonate with me.  What is important to country, imo, is one's commitment to and dedication to their country, not their skin color or ethnic background.  If reducing immigration from "brown" countries results in a smaller and less economically secure country, but preserves the White majority, is that really a win?   
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on August 30, 2017, 11:13:51 pm

Sorry, the only people who deserve no respect are the people who unilaterally decided that no more discussion is allowed and dissenters must be silenced.

That sounds like the right to me:  "If you don't give us our way, we'll shoot doctors to make our point."  "If you don't give us our way, we'll bomb a building and kill 130 people."  "If you don't give us our way, we'll take over a federal building and threaten anyone who comes near."  "If you don't give us our way, we'll shut down the government."  "If you don't give us our way, we'll march with bats and guns, beat people up and chant anti-Semitic slogans."   "If we do these things, it's your fault because .........."

That's how that looks to me. 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 11:22:42 pm
That sounds like the right to me:
Old news.  When the okalahoma bombing occurred i would have agreed that these groups are a greater concern. But today we have left wing zealots systematically repressing opinions they disagree with whether it is an engineer talking about diversity or a magazine editor talking about cultural appropriation or a critic of CO2 policy speaking out on MSM media channels. All of these threads add up to a huge threat to our democratic institutions that far outstrips any danger from a few unhinged right wing radicals.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 30, 2017, 11:27:05 pm
What evidence are you referring to? The basic physics that shows that CO2 is GHG and will cause warming? Well most skeptics agree with than point. The "evidence" from computer models which predicted way more warming than has actually occurred? Not all evidence is equal and discussing which evidence is compelling and which is not is a valid topic for conversation. More importantly, even if the "evidence" is treated as reliable it does not automatically follow that aggressive CO2 reduction policies are the best choice because such policies come with a cost that could easily be greater than cost of warming - especially when the models used to predict the costs of warming are economic models which are notoriously unreliable.

Sorry, the only people who deserve no respect are the people who unilaterally decided that no more discussion is allowed and dissenters must be silenced.

Not all evidence is equal is true. But the peer reviewed expert evidence seems pretty equal. Some discussion as to how close to the tipping point we actually are, but not much doubt as to the fact we are heading there if we do like you would suggest and ignore the facts and sit around for another few years playing politics with science. Luckily cooler heads prevail and hey, I'm following the money baby. Green energy makes green.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 30, 2017, 11:43:08 pm
Not all evidence is equal is true. But the peer reviewed expert evidence seems pretty equal.
So what about the overwhelming consensus in the economics literature that raising minimum wages reduces the number of jobs and hours available to the poorest people? Or the overwhelming consensus in the peer reviewed literature that GMOs are safe. Oh right - peer review is treated as gospel but only if you agree with the conclusions. /sarc



Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 30, 2017, 11:48:14 pm
So what about the overwhelming consensus in the economics literature that raising minimum wages reduces the number of jobs and hours available to the poorest people?

Actually, it's pretty evenly split on that.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 31, 2017, 12:03:04 am
So what about the overwhelming consensus in the economics literature that raising minimum wages reduces the number of jobs and hours available to the poorest people? Or the overwhelming consensus in the peer reviewed literature that GMOs are safe. Oh right - peer review is treated as gospel but only if you agree with the conclusions. /sarc

Maybe you try providing some of this "overwhelming evidence" you speak of, rather than spouting your rightist views. It's pretty well demonstrated that when people make a fair wage they have extra money to spend and businesses benefit. And perhaps some of the peer reviewed on GMO's. I have a feeling you won't be able to come up with anything beyond rebel or breitbart. But go ahead, let's see.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on August 31, 2017, 12:10:11 am
Old news.  When the okalahoma bombing occurred i would have agreed that these groups are a greater concern. But today we have left wing zealots systematically repressing opinions they disagree with whether it is an engineer talking about diversity or a magazine editor talking about cultural appropriation or a critic of CO2 policy speaking out on MSM media channels. All of these threads add up to a huge threat to our democratic institutions that far outstrips any danger from a few unhinged right wing radicals.

So when it's the right blowing stuff up and killing people, it's irrelevant, not a huge problem.   When the left objects to stuff that the right holds dear, it's a huge problem that must be addressed. 

*sigh*

Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 31, 2017, 12:27:37 am
So when it's the right blowing stuff up and killing people, it's irrelevant, not a huge problem.   When the left objects to stuff that the right holds dear, it's a huge problem that must be addressed. 

*sigh*

Sigh is about all you can conclude when confronted with such inappropriate conflation.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on August 31, 2017, 12:28:57 am
So what about the overwhelming consensus in the economics literature that raising minimum wages reduces the number of jobs and hours available to the poorest people? Or the overwhelming consensus in the peer reviewed literature that GMOs are safe. Oh right - peer review is treated as gospel but only if you agree with the conclusions. /sarc

I haven't seen an 'overwhelming consensus' either way on minimum wage, just a lot of disagreement.
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/dont-know-anything-minimum-wage/ (http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/dont-know-anything-minimum-wage/)

I agree, the consensus among scientists is that GMOs are safe. 
http://allianceforscience.cornell.edu/blog/mark-lynas/gmo-safety-debate-over

Yes, some people believe differently, but they don't accept the science either - instead, they claim that the 'people who know the truth have been shut down by (media, government, corporations, the "left", the "right", etc.) and scientists  are bribed to lie to us, so (somebody) will make a lot of money.'  Anti-vaxxers use the same type of argument.   



Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 31, 2017, 12:31:28 am
So when it's the right blowing stuff up and killing people, it's irrelevant, not a huge problem.
Please respond to what I wrote instead creating strawmen. The Oklahoma bombing was 22 years ago.  It is not relevant t to a discussion about today. What the left is doing is happening today and continues today.  As far as other 'lone gunman' events they are generally mentally ill individuals that may have associated with a cause but do not represent any organized force.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 31, 2017, 12:43:46 am
Yes, some people believe differently, but they don't accept the science either - instead, they claim that the 'people who know the truth have been shut down by (media, government, corporations, the "left", the "right", etc.) and scientists  are bribed to lie to us, so (somebody) will make a lot of money.'  Anti-vaxxers use the same type of argument.
When confronted with people who express skeptism it is always worth looking at how scientists know what they claim to know. If the underlying science is based on well established experimental methodologies that have been shown to work then we can have a lot of confidence in the consensus. i.e. vaccines and GMOs use theoretical analysis combined with double blind studies. We know such techniques have limitations but they are generally sound.

OTOH, Climate alarmist claims are based on computer models which cannot be validated within time frames that matter (i.e. it takes at least 20 years to see if a climate model was accurate). This is quite different from computer models used to model aircraft where the models are validated by building planes that fly based on those models. On top of that climate models that try to determine AGW consequences depend on economic models which we know to be notoriously unreliable. Who in their right mind accepts an economic model output as unassailable truth? Why should we be expected to accept the output of a climate model as more meaningful?

Appeals to authority are no replacement for careful thought.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 31, 2017, 12:47:08 am
Please respond to what I wrote instead creating strawmen. The Oklahoma bombing was 22 years ago.  It is not relevant t to a discussion about today. What the left is doing is happening today and continues today.  As far as other 'lone gunman' events they are generally mentally ill individuals that may have associated with a cause but do not represent any organized force.

So move on to current events and then I guess I must assume you must be telling us that the group of gunmen showing up as gunmen in Virginia are all just mentally ill? I tend to agree with you on that. Do you think the hatred came first, or was it simply the mental illness?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on August 31, 2017, 12:52:11 am
Please respond to what I wrote instead creating strawmen. The Oklahoma bombing was 22 years ago.  It is not relevant t to a discussion about today. What the left is doing is happening today and continues today.  As far as other 'lone gunman' events they are generally mentally ill individuals that may have associated with a cause but do not represent any organized force.
The right has been using violence to make their point for decades and that continues today.  They are organized with militia groups, they are recruiting online and they feel empowered enough to show up with weapons and flags to shout WS slogans.  They publish online and hand out pamphlets.  They have an agenda and a plan and they're growing.  Law enforcement agencies are more concerned about right wing violence in the States than Islamic terror attacks.
http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/08/14/fbi-and-dhs-warned-of-growing-threat-from-white-supremacists-months-ago/

But hey, that's irrelevant and even if it isn't ... Its the fault of the left - who have the temerity to protest things that right-wingers don't want protested.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 31, 2017, 12:56:59 am
The right has been using violence to make their point for decades and that continues today.
They are also ineffective. The left, OTOH, is making frightening progress destroying free speech and undermining democracy.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on August 31, 2017, 12:59:59 am
The left, OTOH, is making frightening progress destroying free speech and undermining democracy.

That is merely unsubstantiated opinion.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 31, 2017, 01:12:23 am
That is merely unsubstantiated opinion.
Of course it is an opinion. Unlike many on the left I don't try to claim that my opinions are facts. However, it is hardly unsubstantiated. There is plenty evidence of people with left wing views actively working to suppress opinions they disagree with. This suppression is primarily done via mob actions but it is also done with laws such as the 'Islamophobia' bill the liberals just passed. 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 31, 2017, 01:28:56 am
Of course it is an opinion. Unlike many on the left I don't try to claim that my opinions are facts. However, it is hardly unsubstantiated. There is plenty evidence of people with left wing views actively working to suppress opinions they disagree with. This suppression is primarily done via mob actions but it is also done with laws such as the 'Islamophobia' bill the liberals just passed.

It is absolutely amazing how you continue to contradict yourself. You were just called out for making unsubstantiated opinions, then agree they are simply opinions, claim they are not substantiated, but fail to provide any substantiation, then simply carry on with further of what you were already called out for. That does seem to be your schtick though.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on August 31, 2017, 01:29:26 am
. This suppression is primarily done via mob actions but it is also done with laws such as the 'Islamophobia' bill the liberals just passed.

You mean M103?  Wow, yet another right winger who doesn't know the difference between a motion and a bill and who thinks a study on religious intolerance is an attack on free speech. 
https://www.ourcommons.ca/About/Guides/PrivateMembersBusiness-e.html

Ciao.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 31, 2017, 01:41:27 am
You mean M103?  Wow, yet another right winger who doesn't know the difference between a motion and a bill and who thinks a study on religious intolerance is an attack on free speech.
It is an attempt to restrict free speech (i.e. that is the ultimate objective of the bill's authors). That is a fact. However, what you really want to claim that it is a *justified* restriction on free speech. Such arguments mean nothing to me because I have seen the left make too many completely unjustified attacks on free speech that I am no longer willing to accept any restrictions other than direct incitement of violence. Expressing the opinion that the followers of a particular religion have views which the speaker finds distasteful is not hate speech.

BTW: it may be a motion but it will be cited if people take cases to those kangaroo courts we call human rights tribunals.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Peter F on August 31, 2017, 02:02:42 am
Quote
BTW: it may be a motion but it will be cited if people take cases to those kangaroo courts we call human rights tribunals.

Cited how?  I do believe this would be another case of unsubstantiated opinion. Therefore, by your own logic, Shutup.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 31, 2017, 02:58:45 am
Cited how?  I do believe this would be another case of unsubstantiated opinion. Therefore, by your own logic, Shutup.
Spare me the disingenuous protestations. You know perfectly well that objective of the motion is to increase restrictions on speech. There is simply no other plausible explanation for the use of phrase 'Islamophobia' which is used mainly to bully people expressing opinions that the left does not agree with. The mechanisms for achieving these restrictions will be a committee report whining abut the harms caused by people expressing negative opinions of Islam and recommendations that government do more to prevent people from expressing such opinions.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 31, 2017, 04:41:22 am
Spare me the disingenuous protestations. You know perfectly well that objective of the motion is to increase restrictions on speech. There is simply no other plausible explanation for the use of phrase 'Islamophobia' which is used mainly to bully people expressing opinions that the left does not agree with. The mechanisms for achieving these restrictions will be a committee report whining abut the harms caused by people expressing negative opinions of Islam and recommendations that government do more to prevent people from expressing such opinions.

so I guess in your world those "harms caused" should be just be ignored because hey, what's wrong with a little bigotry/hate speech just for fun. 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 31, 2017, 04:46:41 am
Cited how?  I do believe this would be another case of unsubstantiated opinion. Therefore, by your own logic, Shutup.

Apparently that old adage about "if you find yourself in a hole, it's best to stop digging" slipped by some people.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 31, 2017, 08:14:09 am
It is an attempt to restrict free speech

It is nothing of the sort.  Hate speech against Islam or any group has been illegal in Canada for 60 years.  Nothing has changed with this motion.

None of us, btw, should encourage Islamophobia driven hate - the most common from of hate speech in Canada today.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 31, 2017, 11:01:13 am
None of us, btw, should encourage Islamophobia driven hate - the most common from of hate speech in Canada today.
Actual hate speech is narrowly defined in law (as it should be), however, that is not good enough for those on the left that wish to suppress speech they disagree with. The use of terms 'Islamophobia' to mean saying anything negative about a religion is one of the tactics the left uses to suppress speech they disagree with.

For example, niqabs are a vile garment which are used to reduce women to anonymous chattel. Arguing that such garments have no place in our society is fair comment and not hate speech by any definition - yet people who make that are argument are accused of 'Islamophobia'.

IOW - the argument that combating 'Islamophobia' is about combating hate speech is disingenuous BS.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 31, 2017, 11:12:21 am
Riiight.  The far left don't even own firearms.

I believe that was a reference to the mobs with shields and clubs hitting each other.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 31, 2017, 11:18:18 am
Some of the toughest immigration rules of any western country as I think has already been pointed. Do you not understand, or simply ignore them to suit your purpose?

Tough? What's tough about them? You don't need to have a job offer to come here. You don't need to speak the language. We don't verify your educational credentials, or, for that matter, your alleged skills. If you're related to someone, coming in as a relative with a skilled (allegedly) applicant, or being sponsored afterward, we don't really care about about anything at all. Add to that just about the slackest refugee determination system on the planet. Oh, you're gay and your country isn't progressive? You're in! Oh, you're a woman, and your husband beats you and your government doesn't care? You're in! Oh, you come from a poor country? You're in! Oh, don't worry about being blind or disabled, or having HIV. We have a great health care system! You're seventy? Great! You'll love our health care system! Come on in!
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 31, 2017, 11:27:32 am
You reject the information taken directly from CIC demonstrating that immigration is controlled and has rules, and that much of what you are claiming to be true isn't actually true.  But somehow, this lack of understanding and acceptance on your part is the fault of the 'left' for not listening to your concerns?

Immigration was tripled by Mulroney, not because it would be good for Canada, but because the tories perceived it would mean more votes for them. Now anyone who suggest cutting back immigration is called a racist.

Harper increased immigration going into an election year. For no stated reason. Trudeau increased it again, and increased the number of senior immigrants and family class immigrants. Neither of which is in Canada's interests. All done out of pure narrow political interests.

Thus there is no control on immigration other than what the politicians deem politically expedient. Trudeau floated a trial balloon with a 'committee' which advised draconion increases in immigration. When that got shot down he shrugged and just increased it a little. Immigration is not under the control of CIC and never has been. The refugee panels are stocked with government political appointments. Why? You ever stop to think about that? Wouldn't professionals do a better job?

As for my claims not being true, in all our discussions on the issue you have not once ever managed to show that anything I've said was untrue. Not once.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 31, 2017, 11:32:12 am
Tough? What's tough about them? You don't need to have a job offer to come here. You don't need to speak the language. We don't verify your educational credentials, or, for that matter, your alleged skills. If you're related to someone, coming in as a relative with a skilled (allegedly) applicant, or being sponsored afterward, we don't really care about about anything at all. Add to that just about the slackest refugee determination system on the planet. Oh, you're gay and your country isn't progressive? You're in! Oh, you're a woman, and your husband beats you and your government doesn't care? You're in! Oh, you come from a poor country? You're in! Oh, don't worry about being blind or disabled, or having HIV. We have a great health care system! You're seventy? Great! You'll love our health care system! Come on in!

The point system for immigration was adopted by Canada i 1967 which makes it one of the toughest. You should study it some time ad see just how out of touch you are.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 31, 2017, 11:32:27 am
  What is important to country, imo, is one's commitment to and dedication to their country, not their skin color or ethnic background.

The basis of the fears on immigration rest on love of country. If you think this is a wonderful country with a rich history and feel a sense of kinship with its people then you don't want that destroyed. That means you don't want immigrants coming in so fast they don't have a chance to truly integrate and become Canadianized the way previous generations did. You don't want to bring in so many from a given culture that they form distinct ghetto cultures within your own, particularly if their values and beliefs are diametrically opposed to the ones you believe in.

Right now that is what is happening. How do you become Canadianized in a city where more than half the population is made up of immigrants? How does a kid become Canadianized when he goes to a school where 80% of the kids are foreign, and he can simply hang around people from 'his' ethnic group all through his school days? Then his parents take him 'home' for the summer holidays.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 31, 2017, 11:35:05 am
So when it's the right blowing stuff up and killing people, it's irrelevant, not a huge problem.   When the left objects to stuff that the right holds dear, it's a huge problem that must be addressed. 

*sigh*

You are taking a few isolated instances of far right extremist behaviour over decades, and then saying that's how the right behaves. That's not even worthy of discussion. It's brainless.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 31, 2017, 11:38:06 am
You mean M103?  Wow, yet another right winger who doesn't know the difference between a motion and a bill and who thinks a study on religious intolerance is an attack on free speech. 
https://www.ourcommons.ca/About/Guides/PrivateMembersBusiness-e.html

Ciao.

Maybe he thinks beyond the next twenty four hour news cycle. Maybe he suspects, as many of us do, that this 'study' is going to recommend laws against 'islamophobia', which Trudeau will instantly embrace, and which you and your ilk will great with unrestrained glee.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 31, 2017, 11:39:59 am
so I guess in your world those "harms caused" should be just be ignored because hey, what's wrong with a little bigotry/hate speech just for fun.

Yes, that's exactly right. It's called being a grown-up. Not everyone likes you. Deal with it and quit sniveling. Don't run crying to big brother and demand he make them stop.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 31, 2017, 11:42:01 am
It is nothing of the sort.  Hate speech against Islam or any group has been illegal in Canada for 60 years.  Nothing has changed with this motion.

None of us, btw, should encourage Islamophobia driven hate - the most common from of hate speech in Canada today.

Hate speech, as used by progressives, means anything other than unadulterated awe, respect and veneration of every single aspect of Islam.
And the most common form of hate speech today, as always is antisemitism. That used to be something that concerned the Left until they started to hate Jews more than the far right do.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 31, 2017, 11:43:49 am
The point system for immigration was adopted by Canada i 1967 which makes it one of the toughest. You should study it some time ad see just how out of touch you are.

I'm sure the authors would be proud of the immigrants jammed into every public housing project in Ontario.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 31, 2017, 11:44:41 am
Yes, that's exactly right. It's called being a grown-up. Not everyone likes you. Deal with it and quit sniveling. Don't run crying to big brother and demand he make them stop.

That sort of reply Doesn't sound very "grown up" to me.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on August 31, 2017, 11:56:56 am
Sir John, once again indulging in insults and hyperbole to make his points. 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 31, 2017, 12:58:14 pm
I believe that was a reference to the mobs with shields and clubs hitting each other.

Shields are definitely not an offensive weapon.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 31, 2017, 02:49:30 pm
That sort of reply Doesn't sound very "grown up" to me.

Because I'm not offering up hugs and sympathy? Because I'm suggesting people stop whining? That's life.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 31, 2017, 02:50:25 pm
Shields are definitely not an offensive weapon.

You clearly have never had one rammed into your face.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 31, 2017, 02:56:19 pm
Because I'm not offering up hugs and sympathy? Because I'm suggesting people stop whining? That's life.

No, nobody wants your "hugs and sympathy"  and that's exactly what sounds more like whining.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 31, 2017, 03:07:50 pm
You clearly have never had one rammed into your face.

You should ask yourself why people felt they needed to bring them in the first place.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 31, 2017, 03:59:20 pm
You should ask yourself why people felt they needed to bring them in the first place.

People or just the far left people? Because no one seems to be suggesting the Nazis bringing them was a symbol of their anxiety, fear and peaceful intent.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on August 31, 2017, 04:09:50 pm
Anyway.... 13 pages later, we seem to have one suggestion from SirJohn - that the far right will shoot the far left and that will end it.  This in spite of the fact that the far left are armed (? confusing... I seemed to read contradictory points on that but anyway) because the far left isn't as good at shooting.

Not much really.

The rest of the thread is more left/right sniping mostly over left/right morality and identity politics.  Really deserves its own thread.  But it shows that people WILL take sides when the shooting starts.

Moderator - can we have a new thread for the other stuff ?  Or should I start a new one on topic ?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 31, 2017, 05:09:49 pm
Anyway.... 13 pages later, we seem to have one suggestion from SirJohn
You want an answer to your op? Free Speech unambiguously protected by the government and public institutions. Including:

1) Changes to the labour law prohibiting employers from firing employees for expressing opinions as private individuals in venues outside of work. Exceptions would only exist for people who work in jobs where they are the public face of the company.
 
2) Requiring that universities that allow outside speakers to be required to allow all speakers (i.e. same rules that apply to churches wrt gay marriage).

3) Requiring universities to add 'respecting the free speech of others' to the code of conduct. Students who attempt to prevent others from meeting or speaking will be disciplined or expelled. This should not prevent counter protests - just interference that triggers violance. This is no different from the bubble zone rules around abortion clinics.

4) Government clearly stating that hate speech only applies to the incitement of violence against others and people demanding the hate speech be expanded to include anything they disagree with should be told to go pound salt.

limiting speech will only lead to violence in the long term.
 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 31, 2017, 07:46:47 pm
You want an answer to your op? Free Speech unambiguously protected by the government and public institutions. Including:

1) Changes to the labour law prohibiting employers from firing employees for expressing opinions as private individuals in venues outside of work. Exceptions would only exist for people who work in jobs where they are the public face of the company.
 
2) Requiring that universities that allow outside speakers to be required to allow all speakers (i.e. same rules that apply to churches wrt gay marriage).

3) Requiring universities to add 'respecting the free speech of others' to the code of conduct. Students who attempt to prevent others from meeting or speaking will be disciplined or expelled. This should not prevent counter protests - just interference that triggers violance. This is no different from the bubble zone rules around abortion clinics.

4) Government clearly stating that hate speech only applies to the incitement of violence against others and people demanding the hate speech be expanded to include anything they disagree with should be told to go pound salt.

limiting speech will only lead to violence in the long term.

Your comments seem to be mostly gibberish that indicate you haven't studied, or understood, the laws you seek to undermine very well.

The actual law you seem to be struggling with limits hate speech that is intended to actually lead to violence.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 31, 2017, 08:10:26 pm
The actual law you seem to be struggling with limits hate speech that is intended to actually lead to violence.
Not in the US:

Quote
In June 2017, the Supreme Court affirmed in an unanimous decision on Matal v. Tam that the disparagement clause of the Lanham Act violates the First Amendment's free speech clause. The issue was about government prohibiting the registration of trademarks that are "racially disparaging". Justice Samuel Alito writes:

Speech that demeans on the basis of race, ethnicity, gender, religion, age, disability, or any other similar ground is hateful; but the proudest boast of our free speech jurisprudence is that we protect the freedom to express “the thought that we hate.” United States v. Schwimmer, 279 U. S. 644, 655 (1929) (Holmes, J., dissenting).[94]
In Canada the left has had more success at using hate speech laws to silence opinions they do no like. That is why it is necessary to push back on any further attempt to censor opinions.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 31, 2017, 08:11:59 pm
In Canada the left has had more success at using hate speech laws to silence opinions they do no like. That is why it is necessary to push back on any further attempt to censor opinions.

There has been no attempt to censor beyond hate speech at the federal level.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 31, 2017, 08:16:03 pm
Anyway.... 13 pages later, we seem to have one suggestion from SirJohn - that the far right will shoot the far left and that will end it.

You were the one who suggested a civil war. I just said it would be a brief one since the right is way better armed. Or did you think there could be a civil war with just the raggedy assed Nazis and their white sheeted colleagues?

I did make a suggestion about how things needed to be defused but you ignored it. It had to do with not treating these people like they all need to be stepped on. And no, I'm not talking about the far right, ie, the few thousand idiots who call themselves Nazis and White supremacists, but the people who vote Trump, stay with Trump, and don't trust or like the mainstream media or politicians because they think (rightly) that they don't give a **** about them.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 31, 2017, 08:16:34 pm
There has been no attempt to censor beyond hate speech at the federal level.
The 'Islamophobia' motion is an attempt to codify the idea that hate speech covers anyone who says negative things about Islam. Pretending it is something else is simply dishonest.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 31, 2017, 08:27:20 pm
Not in the US:
In Canada the left has had more success at using hate speech laws to silence opinions they do no like. That is why it is necessary to push back on any further attempt to censor opinions.

First of all we're not in the US, and second of all it seems you once again have not studied or understood the hate speech laws in this country. Opinions are NOT censored so long as they are valid. Here's a little reading for you.

Section 319 prescribes penalties from a fine to imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years for anyone who, by communicating statements in any public place, incites hatred against any identifiable group where such incitement is likely to lead to a breach of the peace.

Under section 319, an accused is not guilty: (a) if he establishes that the statements communicated were true; (b) if, in good faith, the person expressed or attempted to establish by an argument an opinion on a religious subject or an opinion based on a belief in a religious text; (c) if the statements were relevant to any subject of public interest, the discussion of which was for the public benefit, and if on reasonable grounds he believed them to be true; or (d) if, in good faith, he intended to point out, for the purpose of removal, matters producing or tending to produce feelings of hatred toward an identifiable group in Canada.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 31, 2017, 08:28:48 pm
The 'Islamophobia' motion is an attempt to codify the idea that hate speech covers anyone who says negative things about Islam. Pretending it is something else is simply dishonest.

No, actually - it does nothing of the sort.  Saying that and preempting anyone else's response by calling them dishonest doesn't change that.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 31, 2017, 08:53:50 pm
I read a column by George F Will the other day and went back to find it. I think it's pertinent though it deals with a question of the infantalizing of university students. Much of the current left/right madness arises in universities. That's also where a lot of opinion makers are, where journalists and politicians are grown, where activists are spawned.

Often, however, students arrive with little moral ballast bequeathed by parents who thought their role was, Furedi argues, less to transmit values than to validate their children’s feelings and attitudes. “This emphasis on validation,” he says, “runs in tandem with a risk-averse regime of child-rearing, the (unintended) consequence of which has been to limit opportunities for the cultivation of independence and to extend the phase of dependence of young people on adult society.”


So we have a generation of kids going into universities without having been challenged, let alone slapped-down. These are the kids not allowed out of the house alone until they're sixteen, the kids who always got a medal or trophy for participating, the kids schools and parents have always striven to make feel self important and good about themselves. The spoiled rotten kids, in other words, who were never allowed to fail, and never presented with information which might upset or confuse them. They get to universities, and suddenly are aghast at different opinions and beliefs. They're outraged! They want trigger warnings and safe spaces! They want it to stop!

The therapeutic university’s language — students are “vulnerable” to routine stresses and difficulties that are defined as “traumas” — also becomes self-fulfilling. As a result, students experience a diminished sense of capacity for moral agency — for self-determination. This can make them simultaneously passive, immersing themselves into groupthink, and volatile, like the mobs at Middlebury College, Claremont McKenna College, University of California, Berkeley and other schools that disrupt uncongenial speakers. Hence universities provide “trigger warnings” that facilitate flights into “safe spaces.” Furedi quotes an Oberlin College student who says: “There’s something to be said about exposing yourself to ideas other than your own,” but “I’ve had enough of that.”

http://nationalpost.com/opinion/george-f-will-yale-takes-the-lead-in-the-silly-university-thought-police-sweepstakes (http://nationalpost.com/opinion/george-f-will-yale-takes-the-lead-in-the-silly-university-thought-police-sweepstakes)
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on August 31, 2017, 08:54:31 pm
No, actually - it does nothing of the sort.  Saying that and preempting anyone else's response by calling them dishonest doesn't change that.
The intent of the motion is clear: to silence people who would criticize Islam. For evidence look at the number of times that people have been accused of 'Islamaphobia' when expressing opinions which are critical Islam but are otherwise well founded (i.e. pointing out that  he niqab is a tool to oppress women).

The CPC would have supported the motion if the word 'islamaphobia' is removed. It wasn't because the word is too important to the agenda of the authors which is silencing dissent. If I am wrong why wouldn't the liberals compromise on the wording?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on August 31, 2017, 08:56:56 pm
No, actually - it does nothing of the sort.  Saying that and preempting anyone else's response by calling them dishonest doesn't change that.

So you don't think the 'study' is going to recommend laws barring people from saying "Islamophobic things"?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 31, 2017, 09:13:02 pm
So you don't think the 'study' is going to recommend laws barring people from saying "Islamophobic things"?

Obviously you haven't acquainted yourself with what's actually in the motion, (or ignored it)  because of your xenophobia, which you continiously demonstrate whichever name you are going under today.   
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on August 31, 2017, 09:18:23 pm
So you don't think the 'study' is going to recommend laws barring people from saying "Islamophobic things"?

I don't think that - no.  Why would I think that? 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on August 31, 2017, 09:30:32 pm
So you don't think the 'study' is going to recommend laws barring people from saying "Islamophobic things"?

Maybe you should take a moment to catch us up on what exactly you mean by "Islamophobic things".
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on September 01, 2017, 08:12:56 am
You want an answer to your op? Free Speech unambiguously protected by the government and public institutions. Including:

1) Changes to the labour law prohibiting employers from firing employees for expressing opinions as private individuals in venues outside of work. Exceptions would only exist for people who work in jobs where they are the public face of the company.

I'm ok with this, but in the US it's not going to happen.  Employers right to fire is sacrosanct and they can fire you for just being gay.

I remember the blacklist, where people were fired for holding private views in favour of socialism, so I don't think people should be fired for having or even expressing opinions in most cases.  But, again, it's not going to happen.  What will happen is what happened in the past: people will shut up.
 
Quote
2) Requiring that universities that allow outside speakers to be required to allow all speakers (i.e. same rules that apply to churches wrt gay marriage).

Churches aren't required to marry gays, not sure how that applies here.  Universities can't be required to allow 'all' speakers, that's ridiculous.  Probably a better idea to encourage debate and discourage violent protest in response to opinions you don't like.  Universities do appear to try to allow such speakers, but they fold easily in the face of 'security concerns' etc.

Quote
3) Requiring universities to add 'respecting the free speech of others' to the code of conduct. Students who attempt to prevent others from meeting or speaking will be disciplined or expelled. This should not prevent counter protests - just interference that triggers violance. This is no different from the bubble zone rules around abortion clinics.

Well, an abortion clinic is not a public forum or a public space.  Making protest zones outside is a good idea IMO.

Quote
4) Government clearly stating that hate speech only applies to the incitement of violence against others and people demanding the hate speech be expanded to include anything they disagree with should be told to go pound salt.

That IS the definition of hate speech isn't it ?
 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on September 01, 2017, 08:15:24 am
I did make a suggestion about how things needed to be defused but you ignored it. It had to do with not treating these people like they all need to be stepped on. And no, I'm not talking about the far right, ie, the few thousand idiots who call themselves Nazis and White supremacists, but the people who vote Trump, stay with Trump, and don't trust or like the mainstream media or politicians because they think (rightly) that they don't give a **** about them.

I think the other suggestions I saw were about the other side "smartening up"... from both sides.  I think this will all blow over sooner than that happens.  If I missed something else, let me know.  I don't "ignore" things.  If you don't trust me on that, I can't help you.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on September 01, 2017, 08:22:07 am
 

So we have a generation of kids going into universities without having been challenged, let alone slapped-down. These are the kids not allowed out of the house alone until they're sixteen, the kids who always got a medal or trophy for participating, the kids schools and parents have always striven to make feel self important and good about themselves. The spoiled rotten kids, in other words, who were never allowed to fail, and never presented with information which might upset or confuse them. They get to universities, and suddenly are aghast at different opinions and beliefs. They're outraged! They want trigger warnings and safe spaces! They want it to stop! 

Meh.  Complaining about the kids is an old hobby.  I was working on a web application for a financial institution, and the designers were young people out of university.  For a form that asked for gender, they proposed offering 'Other' as an option, along with 'M' and 'F' and the clients laughed at it.  The designers took the suggestion, and it was 'M' and 'F'.  They moved on.  There was no tantrum, no sit-in, nothing more said.  Idealism on campus doesn't translate to a real world where you have limited say in matters, and they understood this.  In 20 years, they will be the ones making the decisions and you will see another option besides 'M' and 'F'. 

 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on September 01, 2017, 08:24:05 am
I don't think that - no.  Why would I think that?

Would you support a law that limited the criticism of Islam ?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on September 01, 2017, 08:53:21 am
I'm ok with this, but in the US it's not going to happen.
Depends on how it is pitched. The law would actual help employers when faced with mobs demanding blood. If there is a law the employer can tell the mob that they can't fire the employee and boycotts are pointless. One of the reasons Google fired Damore is the publicity could have made Google liable in 'hostile workplace' lawsuits if they did not fire him.  A law prohibiting Google from firing him would have the effect of protecting Google from liability.

Churches aren't required to marry gays, not sure how that applies here.
If churches make their facilities available to non-members then they can't discriminate. If universities allow a student group to organize an event for an anti-semetic BSD activist then they should be compelled to allow a student group to organize an event for an anti-abortion evangelical. I looking for ways to prevent what happens today when left wing speakers can spout whatever nonsense they want but right wing speakers are blocked.

Well, an abortion clinic is not a public forum or a public space.  Making protest zones outside is a good idea IMO.
Bubble laws were brought in because anti-abortion protesters harassed people trying to enter the clinic so now protest is allowed but they can't get too close to the clinic even if the area outside the clinic is a public space. The same should be true for protests against speakers - they are obviously fair game in a world of free speech but they have to be far enough away from the venue that they do not interfere other people's right to free speech.

That IS the definition of hate speech isn't it ?
In the US. Left wing activists frequently forget this. In Canada anything negative said about an 'oppressed' group can deemed hated speech. There is no clear principle in Canada that prevents anti-hate laws from being used to suppress dissent. We really depend on the common sense of the judge hearing the case.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on September 01, 2017, 09:16:08 am
Depends on how it is pitched. The law would actual help employers when faced with mobs demanding blood. If there is a law the employer can tell the mob that they can't fire the employee and boycotts are pointless. One of the reasons Google fired Damore is the publicity could have made Google liable in 'hostile workplace' lawsuits if they did not fire him.  A law prohibiting Google from firing him would have the effect of protecting Google from liability.

It's hard to see how Google would be obliged to keep him, if he actually opposed company policy and voiced that.  Of course, Google set themselves up by setting up a discussion group for 'open discussion'.  If they wanted to keep him, though, your law would probably help.

Quote
If churches make their facilities available to non-members then they can't discriminate. If universities allow a student group to organize an event for an anti-semetic BSD activist then they should be compelled to allow a student group to organize an event for an anti-abortion evangelical. I looking for ways to prevent what happens today when left wing speakers can spout whatever nonsense they want but right wing speakers are blocked.

Shine light on the situation, is the answer.  McGill fired someone for writing an anti-Quebec article in a Canadian magazine with pressure from the PMO office.  Not really covered in the MSM, and so no fuss is made.

Quote
We really depend on the common sense of the judge hearing the case.

Probably better than relying on politicians and administrators.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on September 01, 2017, 09:27:59 am
Would you support a law that limited the criticism of Islam ?

I wouldn't, just for the record.  We already have laws against hate speech and a special category for hate crimes and so I think that should suffice.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on September 01, 2017, 09:33:05 am
It's hard to see how Google would be obliged to keep him, if he actually opposed company policy and voiced that.  Of course, Google set themselves up by setting up a discussion group for 'open discussion'.  If they wanted to keep him, though, your law would probably help.
Damore followed Google's policies for expressing such opinions (i.e. posting to a internal group for such discussions). He was only fired because someone else leaked the memo and people made false assertions about what the memo said. The idea that someone could lose their job for not what they say but what other people claim you said is particularly odious. Companies would benefit from the protection such a law provides.

Probably better than relying on politicians and administrators.
Judges need clear principles. I like the US principles: no incitement for immediate violence but anything else is allowed.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest7 on September 01, 2017, 10:33:51 am
so I guess in your world those "harms caused" should be just be ignored because hey, what's wrong with a little bigotry/hate speech just for fun.

They would in mine.  No-one has the right not to be offended.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 01, 2017, 10:40:07 am
They would in mine.  No-one has the right not to be offended.

But what if it was your mommy?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 01, 2017, 11:09:17 am
Obviously you haven't acquainted yourself with what's actually in the motion, (or ignored it)  because of your xenophobia, which you continiously demonstrate whichever name you are going under today.

Yeah I read it. Perhaps you haven't acquainted yourself with what's in it because of your low education, intelligence and poor comprehension skills. Have someone smart read it to you using one syllable words.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest7 on September 01, 2017, 11:14:51 am
But what if it was your mommy?

My Mommy was frequently offended.  Too bad, I say.  Suck it up, Mum.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 01, 2017, 11:15:42 am
A couple more articles in the left-right wars today. The first is from the Washington Post.

As if to prove Cummings’ point, the antifa movement responded with jackboots and clubs — because their definition of “fascist” includes not just neo-Nazis but also anyone who opposes their totalitarian worldview.

And let’s be clear: totalitarian is precisely what they are. Mark Bray, a Dartmouth lecturer who has defended antifa’s violent tactics, recently explained in The Post, “Its adherents are predominantly communists, socialists and anarchists” who believe that physical violence “is both ethically justifiable and strategically effective.” In other words, they are no different from neo-Nazis.


https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/yes-antifa-is-the-moral-equivalent-of-neo-nazis/2017/08/30/9a13b2f6-8d00-11e7-91d5-ab4e4bb76a3a_story.html?utm_term=.bfc179bfda48 (https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/yes-antifa-is-the-moral-equivalent-of-neo-nazis/2017/08/30/9a13b2f6-8d00-11e7-91d5-ab4e4bb76a3a_story.html?utm_term=.bfc179bfda48)

The second is from Christie Blatchford writing on the Toronto School Board's decision to end a decade long program of having police in schools because BLM demanded it out of fears some minority students might be intimidated by their presence.

The program, which began about nine years ago in the wake of the 2007 shooting death of Jordan Manners at C.W. Jefferys Collegiate, is done, the latest casualty of the tyranny of a minority. Across the country, this list grows daily, with strident voices and violence real or threatened affecting everything from rodeos (animal activists in British Columbia) to public hearings (the National Energy Board sessions cancelled this week in Montreal, police board meetings disrupted in Toronto) to comedy shows and university forums.

http://nationalpost.com/opinion/christie-blatchford-school-policing-program-latest-casualty-of-the-tyranny-of-a-minority (http://nationalpost.com/opinion/christie-blatchford-school-policing-program-latest-casualty-of-the-tyranny-of-a-minority)
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on September 01, 2017, 11:20:21 am
Yeah I read it. Perhaps you haven't acquainted yourself with what's in it because of your low education, intelligence and poor comprehension skills. Have someone smart read it to you using one syllable words.

Insults.  Contempt.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 01, 2017, 11:25:02 am
I don't think that - no.  Why would I think that?

Perhaps because the point of the study is to find a government recognizes the need to quell the 'increasing public climate of hate and fear" - although no one has demonstrated there is any such public climate. How does government quell 'islamophobia' which is also not defined?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 01, 2017, 11:25:43 am
Insults.  Contempt.

He gets what he gives. But congratulations on your one-sided moderation attempts being consistent from one forum to another.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on September 01, 2017, 11:26:49 am
He gets what he gives. But congratulations on your one-sided moderation being consistent from one forum to another.

I'm not a moderator on either forum.  I think the charge of xenophobia bears a response, unlike calling someone stupid.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on September 01, 2017, 11:29:06 am
Yeah I read it. Perhaps you haven't acquainted yourself with what's in it because of your low education, intelligence and poor comprehension skills. Have someone smart read it to you using one syllable words.

I found it and read it.  Nowhere did it suggest limits on free speech or prohibition of criticism of religion or Islam.   
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 01, 2017, 11:29:13 am
I'm not a moderator on either forum.  I think the charge of xenophobia bears a response, unlike calling someone stupid.

Bears a response? He got the response he deserved. I'm sure he DOES in fact, think I'm xenophobic. I DO in fact, think he's stupid. So where does that leave us? If he wants to make his unvarnished opinion of me clear I'll do the same.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 01, 2017, 11:32:58 am
Yeah I read it. Perhaps you haven't acquainted yourself with what's in it because of your low education, intelligence and poor comprehension skills. Have someone smart read it to you using one syllable words.

hahaha, typical Argus nonsense, insults, little substance. Do you know anybody smart?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on September 01, 2017, 11:34:10 am
Bears a response? He got the response he deserved. I'm sure he DOES in fact, think I'm xenophobic. I DO in fact, think he's stupid. So where does that leave us? If he wants to make his unvarnished opinion of me clear I'll do the same.

Xenophobia comprises a set of opinions that can be rationalized or not, so it's about your opinions. 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 01, 2017, 11:35:02 am
I found it and read it.  Nowhere did it suggest limits on free speech or prohibition of criticism of religion or Islam.

That isn't how these things work. I've lived in Ottawa for almost 40 years. My mother, an uncle and two siblings worked on the Hill. I've been a political junkie since then, when my mother would bring home paper copies of Hansard daily. These things are always phrased in terms of solving dreadful problems (often not proven) and the need to 'protect' the community or members of it, from something politicians don't like.

I'm fairly certain things started like this in France and the UK decades ago, which led to laws criminalizing just about any kind of critical public commentary on Islam - along with, of course, any critical, insulting or offensive or derogatory references, even in private, to other people's ethnicity, religion, gender, sexual preference, etc. You can literally go to prison for calling someone an insulting name even in private.

That has not, need I point this out, done a single thing to deter racism or encourage assimilation. France and the UK are as divided by racial and religious animosity as any nations in the West. Race riots are not unusual. They are certainly far more divided than Canada and the US which have no such laws.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 01, 2017, 11:36:19 am
Xenophobia comprises a set of opinions that can be rationalized or not, so it's about your opinions.

Stupidity also comprises a set of opinions and beliefs, so it's about his opinions.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 01, 2017, 11:37:49 am
hahaha, typical Argus nonsense, insults, little substance. Do you know anybody smart?

My posts have substance when I'm interacting with posters who have substance.

You might reflect on that, presuming (I'm being generous) self-reflection is within your capabilities.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on September 01, 2017, 11:38:24 am
Stupidity also comprises a set of opinions and beliefs, so it's about his opinions.

No, stupidity is about the person themselves.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest7 on September 01, 2017, 11:39:09 am
No, stupidity is about the person themselves.

Isn't xenophobia?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 01, 2017, 11:42:08 am
Isn't xenophobia?

Of course they are. Now here I am writing reasonably (I think) about a subject which involves M103 and my issues with it. Anyone capable of intelligent dialogue who disagrees can point out how they disagree with my opinion and why without casting aspersions on my character. But if a person's only response - one they use almost all the time - is to call me names why would I not simply think they're stupid? Certainly they're responses are.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on September 01, 2017, 11:43:11 am
Isn't xenophobia?

It's about the opinions.  "I don't want immigration" is the opinion.  Is it xenophobia or not ?  You can argue that.  Calling someone stupid just says they're inferior.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 01, 2017, 11:44:45 am
It's about the opinions.  "I don't want immigration" is the opinion.  Is it xenophobia or not ?  You can argue that.  Calling someone stupid just says they're inferior.

Calling someone xenophobic is casting aspersions on their character, and suggesting their opinions have no merit because they arise out of psychological problems. How is that an improvement on calling someone stupid - which suggest they're opinions have no merit because they have no brains?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 01, 2017, 11:44:59 am
My posts have substance when I'm interacting with posters who have substance.

You might reflect on that, presuming (I'm being generous) self-reflection is within your abilities.

As do mine. Except if I get disagreed with I try not to get disagreeable.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 01, 2017, 11:46:26 am
As do mine. Except if I get disagreed with I try not to get disagreeable.

I don't get disagreeable when I'm disagreed with. I get disagreeable when idiots call me names rather than expressing any valid opinion as to the substance of what I posted.

I have a fairly long and consistent history in that regard. I would have thought most people might have noticed by now.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on September 01, 2017, 11:48:47 am
Calling someone xenophobic is casting aspersions on their character, and suggesting their opinions have no merit because they arise out of psychological problems. How is that an improvement on calling someone stupid - which suggest they're opinions have no merit because they have no brains?

You can discuss it and show that it's not xenophobia.  Also, xenophobia in terms of not wanting foreigners, is also defensible. 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 01, 2017, 11:56:29 am
In order to defend it you'd have to admit it. Continious citing of far right sources such as the Fraser Institute is an attempt to promote it without admitting to it. But it's all rather transparent.
 And with that I must sign off for now, have a meeting in about 10 minutes.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest7 on September 01, 2017, 11:58:13 am
You can discuss it and show that it's not xenophobia.  Also, xenophobia in terms of not wanting foreigners, is also defensible.

You can show it's not xenophobia until the cows come home, it won't make the blindest bit of difference to the terminally outraged.

Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 01, 2017, 12:00:42 pm
In order to defend it you'd have to admit it. Continious citing of far right sources such as the Fraser Institute

The Fraser Institute is a far right source now? I would suggest that only someone on the far left would offer up an opinion like that.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 01, 2017, 12:11:28 pm
I looked at the links that do not provide any evidence to support your claim (hint differences in work force participation do not establish evidence of racism). You simply assumed it does because you want to believe that to be true.
Differences in workforce participation!? Did you read the links? In many cases it was differences in even getting an interview, let alone hiring practices. Those applicants ARE  participating. What a ridiculous thing for you to say. This is why I generally ignore most of your posts because you are completely irrational. I should put a book together of your posts to show students how fascinating cognitive biases can be because you are a case study of the worst possible confirmation bias I have ever seen in my life.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on September 01, 2017, 12:18:17 pm
You can show it's not xenophobia until the cows come home, it won't make the blindest bit of difference to the terminally outraged.

Well, that's what happens on a forum.  At least you have a shot at discussion, whereas with an insult like 'stupid' it's just a thread stopper.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 01, 2017, 12:18:49 pm
You do know the high school dropout rate for Blacks is three times what it is for Whites, right?
Do you think black kids have the resources that white kids have when not very long ago their parents and grandparents weren't even allowed in the same school as white kids? Do you think that the parents' education may actually make things easier or harder for a student? Do you think that the parents' household income might make things easier or harder for students?

Your "fact" when contextualized is utter nonsense when you don't contextualize the fact that there are significant barriers that black people disproportionately face due to historical oppression.

Are there white families that have parents who didn't get an education and who are extremely poor? Absolutely they are. And guess what. Those kids do poorly in school too.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on September 01, 2017, 12:19:47 pm
Would you support a law that limited the criticism of Islam ?

Not beyond hate speech
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 01, 2017, 12:23:41 pm
You are making my argument for me: the left is intolerant of ideas that they disagree with and actively seek to suppress them.

Your complete lack of self awareness is typical.
A lot of people are intolerant to intolerance on both the left and the right. That's not being closed-minded. That's called preserving civil society.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 01, 2017, 12:25:59 pm
Anyway.... 13 pages later, we seem to have one suggestion from SirJohn - that the far right will shoot the far left and that will end it.  This in spite of the fact that the far left are armed (? confusing... I seemed to read contradictory points on that but anyway) because the far left isn't as good at shooting.

Not much really.

The rest of the thread is more left/right sniping mostly over left/right morality and identity politics.  Really deserves its own thread.  But it shows that people WILL take sides when the shooting starts.

Moderator - can we have a new thread for the other stuff ?  Or should I start a new one on topic ?
Oh yes. The far right armed and ready to shoot people is good. The left being armed and ready to shoot people is bad.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on September 01, 2017, 12:27:32 pm
Oh yes. The far right armed and ready to shoot people is good. The left being armed and ready to shoot people is bad.

I don't think anybody said that, though.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest7 on September 01, 2017, 12:38:13 pm
Not beyond hate speech

Therein lies the problem.  I find much of Islam fully warrants speech that many would call hateful.  You might set the bar differently than I. 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 01, 2017, 12:39:02 pm
Therein lies the problem.  I find much of Islam fully warrants speech that many would call hateful.  You might set the bar differently than I.
We have hate speech laws.

Here you go. This is the bar: http://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/C-46/section-319.html
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: wilber on September 01, 2017, 12:43:38 pm
I've always considered myself to be a small c conservative but these days all I get called is a lefty. Times change.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on September 01, 2017, 12:54:36 pm
Differences in workforce participation!? Did you read the links? In many cases it was differences in even getting an interview, let alone hiring practices. Those applicants ARE  participating. What a ridiculous thing for you to say. This is why I generally ignore most of your posts because you are completely irrational. I should put a book together of your posts to show students how fascinating cognitive biases can be because you are a case study of the worst possible confirmation bias I have ever seen in my life.
Wow. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black. What was presented is data regarding differences in employment. You are simply *assuming* that the differences are the result of racist employers even though there is no evidence presented to support that assertion. Your reaction is a textbook example of confirmation bias. i.e. you see racism because that is what you want to see. You don't see or dismiss other plausible explanations for the differences in data because those explanations don't support your predetermined world view.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest7 on September 01, 2017, 12:57:48 pm
We have hate speech laws.

Here you go. This is the bar: http://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/C-46/section-319.html

Yes, of course.  The question is not whether or not they exist.  The question is whether or not they are any good.

If they limit the freedom to criticise anyone, they are not.

It would depend on the application. (and therefore on the Judge, I suppose)

I would defer to the right to hate every time.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 01, 2017, 01:32:32 pm
Wow. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black. What was presented is data regarding differences in employment. You are simply *assuming* that the differences are the result of racist employers even though there is no evidence presented to support that assertion. Your reaction is a textbook example of confirmation bias. i.e. you see racism because that is what you want to see. You don't see or dismiss other plausible explanations for the differences in data because those explanations don't support your predetermined world view.
There is a difference in hiring blacks and whites. A racial difference. That is racism. Period. You look at systemic racism and constantly conflate that with individual prejudice or discrimination. You have a terrible grasp of the concept of racism that you really need to address before trying to lecture me on what "racism" is.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 01, 2017, 01:33:24 pm
Like JMT said, "I guess it's just a coincidence to you."
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on September 01, 2017, 02:13:51 pm
There is a difference in hiring blacks and whites. A racial difference. That is racism. Period.
Nope. It more likely a reflection of the differences in job qualifications.  The fact that AIs now seem to show the same biases in their decision making supports the argument that the differences are not simply the result of race being a factor in the decision to hire. It is at best an irrelevant detail that happens to correlated with factors that do matter.

Period. You look at systemic racism and constantly conflate that with individual prejudice or discrimination.
The post I responded to claimed those links supported his assertion that "white males preferred to hire white males". I correctly pointed out that those links offered zero evidence support the claim that individuals were using race as factor in their hiring decisions.

You seem to want to constantly take the structural disadvantages faced by all poor people and claim they are evidence of 'systematic racism'. Poor people face challenges and it would be a lot easier to address them if people like you weren't fixated on turning everything into a question of race.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 01, 2017, 04:22:57 pm
Do you think black kids have the resources that white kids have when not very long ago their parents and grandparents weren't even allowed in the same school as white kids? Do you think that the parents' education may actually make things easier or harder for a student? Do you think that the parents' household income might make things easier or harder for students?

No.  Harder. Yes. Although I would say that you're talking grandparents here, not parents.

Quote
Your "fact" when contextualized is utter nonsense when you don't contextualize the fact that there are significant barriers that black people disproportionately face due to historical oppression.

But the 'context' in which I brought that up is that the higher number of Black dropouts would most certainly have a strong impact on their employability. Thus it would be completely normal for Black unemployment to be higher, and Black earnings to be lower than that of White or Asian workers.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 01, 2017, 05:59:06 pm
Well, that's what happens on a forum.  At least you have a shot at discussion, whereas with an insult like 'stupid' it's just a thread stopper.

So is 'racist' or 'xenophobe'.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest7 on September 01, 2017, 06:57:00 pm
So is 'racist' or 'xenophobe'.

I think that is definitely the goal when words like that are used.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on September 01, 2017, 07:48:37 pm
Like JMT said, "I guess it's just a coincidence to you."

In fairness - I used to think so too.  I've learned a lot over the last few years.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on September 01, 2017, 07:50:38 pm
I think that is definitely the goal when words like that are used.

So if SJ calls someone stupid, he's trying to get them to shut up?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 01, 2017, 08:05:02 pm
So is 'racist' or 'xenophobe'.

No it's more like a case of "when the shoe fits". Even when evidence is presented to you that immigrants in general actually augment this country, certainly commercially, and for those of us who actually don't mind the idea of a mosaic within our society, culturally, you hark back to the likes of the Fraser etc., right wing outfits that will happily provide evidence, bogus or not, that will support your feelings. I love the fact that in my hometown I can stroll downtown and choose from a selection of food joints that are a hell of a lot more fun than Macdonalds.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest7 on September 01, 2017, 08:38:32 pm
So if SJ calls someone stupid, he's trying to get them to shut up?

I can't speak to his motives, but the only time I saw him say that was in response to an accusation of xenophobia, so it seemed reasonable.

Such accusations are usually, as I stated, an attempt to shut off discussion and avoid answering whatever point resulted in the accusation.  On a discussion forum, that could be described as stupid, I suppose.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest7 on September 01, 2017, 08:40:16 pm
No it's more like a case of "when the shoe fits". Even when evidence is presented to you that immigrants in general actually augment this country, certainly commercially, and for those of us who actually don't mind the idea of a mosaic within our society, culturally, you hark back to the likes of the Fraser etc., right wing outfits that will happily provide evidence, bogus or not, that will support your feelings. I love the fact that in my hometown I can stroll downtown and choose from a selection of food joints that are a hell of a lot more fun than Macdonalds.

So do I. And I don't care who's cooking and selling it.  As long as it's good, of course.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 01, 2017, 08:46:02 pm
I can't speak to his motives, but the only time I saw him say that was in response to an accusation of xenophobia, so it seemed reasonable.

Such accusations are usually, as I stated, an attempt to shut off discussion and avoid answering whatever point resulted in the accusation.  On a discussion forum, that could be described as stupid, I suppose.

I can speak to his motives, he likes to make comments that demonstrate xenophobia, and resorts to insults when the nature of those comments are pointed out. and if you think that's the only time he has gone that route with various posters you haven't been paying attention.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest7 on September 01, 2017, 08:58:17 pm
I can speak to his motives, he likes to make comments that demonstrate xenophobia, and resorts to insults when the nature of those comments are pointed out. and if you think that's the only time he has gone that route with various posters you haven't been paying attention.

Well, I have been busy, I admit, but given the number of times I have seen unjustified accusations of racism and xenophobia (and bigotry.  Let's not forget bigotry) in response to valid, if somewhat insensitive points I have made, it seemed reasonable to believe others might suffer the same fate.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on September 01, 2017, 09:49:35 pm
In fairness - I used to think so too.  I've learned a lot over the last few years.
I have learned a lot too about how poverty creates real disadvantages for people that lead to vicious cycles that last generations. I have learned how the complicated mess of petty laws in the US that carry felony convictions or fines that beggar the poor only exacerbate these disadvantages.  But none of this adds up to anything I would call 'systematic racism' and trying to frame it as a question of race instead of poverty question only divides people and ensures there will never be any real progress. If there is to be affirmative action for universities it should be based on family history - not race. The child of a Chinese single mother with a high school education that worked her life as a maid deserves priority over the children of Obama. But that is not what happens today.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 01, 2017, 10:21:41 pm
Well, I have been busy, I admit, but given the number of times I have seen unjustified accusations of racism and xenophobia (and bigotry.  Let's not forget bigotry) in response to valid, if somewhat insensitive points I have made, it seemed reasonable to believe others might suffer the same fate.

Typical nebulous comment which seeks to replace the word "xenophobia" and replace it with what you seem to think is a much gentle word like "insensitivity". Well here's another little word for ya, "obfuscation".
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest7 on September 01, 2017, 11:16:44 pm
Typical nebulous comment which seeks to replace the word "xenophobia" and replace it with what you seem to think is a much gentle word like "insensitivity". Well here's another little word for ya, "obfuscation".

That's exactly what I mean.  Valid criticism, while it might be insensitive, is not xenophobic.  And there's certainly no obligation for anyone to be sensitive.  Ever.

But you just can't have that.  You're incapable.

 I'm surprised you would make my point for me so obviuosly.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 02, 2017, 12:07:00 am
That's exactly what I mean.  Valid criticism, while it might be insensitive, is not xenophobic.  And there's certainly no obligation for anyone to be sensitive.  Ever.

But you just can't have that.  You're incapable.

 I'm surprised you would make my point for me so obviuosly.

I think you actually just made my point. You can't seem to figure xenophobia is simply a version of insensitivity. But your little bouncy guy suits you.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on September 02, 2017, 12:53:22 am
That's exactly what I mean.  Valid criticism, while it might be insensitive, is not xenophobic.  And there's certainly no obligation for anyone to be sensitive.  Ever.


Here is some of what you are calling 'valid criticiscm':
Muslims are barbaric, backward, violent, misogynistic, unable to integrate with Canadian culture and values. 
Muslims all look alike and think alike. 
Women who wear headscarfs are fanatics. 
Using a survey to 'prove' Muslims are becoming more religious (fanatical) while rejecting the parts of the same survey that demonstrate Muslims are becoming more integrated with mainstream Canadian values and beliefs. 
Misusing another survey to claim that the majority of Muslims want to kill gays, although the question in the survey wasn't "Do you want to kill gays", it was "Do you think a homosexual can also be Muslim".
Insisting that Muslims are not 'economically viable', despite the many thousands of Muslims across Canada who are employed in very good jobs.
Assuming that crime and poverty are the inevitable state of Muslim immigrants, again despite the many thousands of working Muslims in Canada.

When someone says those same things over and over and over and over, denying people any worth in terms of social or economic value, it's not valid criticism, it's something else - the word we aren't allowed to say because God forbid someone should feel insulted in their quest to insult and demean virtually every Muslim in the world.   

Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on September 02, 2017, 07:59:52 am
I have learned a lot too about how poverty creates real disadvantages for people that lead to vicious cycles that last generations. I have learned how the complicated mess of petty laws in the US that carry felony convictions or fines that beggar the poor only exacerbate these disadvantages.  But none of this adds up to anything I would call 'systematic racism' and trying to frame it as a question of race instead of poverty question only divides people and ensures there will never be any real progress. If there is to be affirmative action for universities it should be based on family history - not race. The child of a Chinese single mother with a high school education that worked her life as a maid deserves priority over the children of Obama. But that is not what happens today.
This.  You can look at policies such as healthcare and the drug problem also and see that a more pragmatic approach to government is happening in the US, apart from identity politics.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 02, 2017, 10:08:36 am
Here is some of what you are calling 'valid criticiscm':
Muslims are barbaric, backward, violent, misogynistic, unable to integrate with Canadian culture and values. 
Muslims all look alike and think alike. 
Women who wear headscarfs are fanatics. 
Using a survey to 'prove' Muslims are becoming more religious (fanatical) while rejecting the parts of the same survey that demonstrate Muslims are becoming more integrated with mainstream Canadian values and beliefs. 
Misusing another survey to claim that the majority of Muslims want to kill gays, although the question in the survey wasn't "Do you want to kill gays", it was "Do you think a homosexual can also be Muslim".
Insisting that Muslims are not 'economically viable', despite the many thousands of Muslims across Canada who are employed in very good jobs.
Assuming that crime and poverty are the inevitable state of Muslim immigrants, again despite the many thousands of working Muslims in Canada.

When someone says those same things over and over and over and over, denying people any worth in terms of social or economic value, it's not valid criticism, it's something else - the word we aren't allowed to say because God forbid someone should feel insulted in their quest to insult and demean virtually every Muslim in the world.

If I ever hit the jackpot with a lottery ticket I'll maybe hand out a few plane tickets. Perhaps if certain people were allowed to get off their block and see a bit of the world, they would also see just how faulty their pre conceived notions are.  Yes there are trouble spots abroad, just as there are here, but a little mixing and mingling could help relieve the paranoia.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest7 on September 02, 2017, 10:34:48 am
I think you actually just made my point. You can't seem to figure xenophobia is simply a version of insensitivity. But your little bouncy guy suits you.

Leave Zebedee out of this.  He's apolitical.  Just don't mess with him at bedtime.

I disagree 100% with your point there.  Insensitivity does not, in any way, equate to xenophobia.

The notion that it does, for some,  explains a lot though...
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 02, 2017, 10:48:43 am
Leave Zebedee out of this.  He's apolitical.  Just don't mess with him at bedtime.

I disagree 100% with your point there.  Insensitivity does not, in any way, equate to xenophobia.

The notion that it does, for some,  explains a lot though...

 Insensitivity begets xenophobia. They go hand in hand. I suggest looking for a dictionary some time.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on September 02, 2017, 10:58:49 am
If I ever hit the jackpot with a lottery ticket I'll maybe hand out a few plane tickets. Perhaps if certain people were allowed to get off their block and see a bit of the world, they would also see just how faulty their pre conceived notions are.  Yes there are trouble spots abroad, just as there are here, but a little mixing and mingling could help relieve the paranoia.

Maybe give them running shoes, too.  There's a movie about Kristina Palten, a Swedish woman who ran across Iran, alone.  She chose Iran because of her own prejudices that she wanted to challenge.   Rather than being beaten, **** or killed because she was a non-believer or a woman, she was welcomed, fed and gifted.
http://www.alonethroughiran.com/ (http://www.alonethroughiran.com/)
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest7 on September 02, 2017, 11:03:55 am
Insensitivity begets xenophobia. They go hand in hand. I suggest looking for a dictionary some time.

No it doesn't.  No they don't.  I don't need a dictionary.

I find this to be a very strange argument.  Whereas someone who has an "intense or irrational dislike or fear of people from other countries" might very well be insensitive to their feelings when discussing them, so might anyone else.  Xenophobes drink water too. 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on September 02, 2017, 11:11:12 am
No it doesn't.  No they don't.  I don't need a dictionary.


Of course, being insensitive doesn't equal xenophobia.  But in order to be xenophobic, one must also be insensitive and lack empathy to some degree.   It's sensitivity and empathy that lets one view the 'other' as human and worthwhile, rather than as so different they cannot be known or understood and so must be feared.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 02, 2017, 11:15:22 am
Maybe give them running shoes, too.  There's a movie about Kristina Palten, a Swedish woman who ran across Iran, alone.  She chose Iran because of her own prejudices that she wanted to challenge.   Rather than being beaten, **** or killed because she was a non-believer or a woman, she was welcomed, fed and gifted.
http://www.alonethroughiran.com/ (http://www.alonethroughiran.com/)

I do recall hearing that story. I spent a couple of months working in Iran, both in Tehran and down on Kish Island, (beautiful). I wasn't jogging but I was working with both local men and women. I had a similar experience. Once again, travel is very educational.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 02, 2017, 11:19:23 am
No it's more like a case of "when the shoe fits".

<shrug> And right back at you. [edited]

Quote
Even when evidence is presented to you that immigrants

I'm not going to argue immigration in this thread. Suffice to say your 'evidence' is threadbare and often clearly wrong.

Quote
I love the fact that in my hometown I can stroll downtown and choose from a selection of food joints that are a hell of a lot more fun than Macdonalds.

Thanks for reinforcing my assessment of the shallowness of immigration supporters. It's not about terrorism or hatred of women and Jews and minorities or economic failure at huge cost to the rest of us, it's about you being able to eat at ethnic restaurants.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 02, 2017, 11:22:32 am
No it doesn't.  No they don't.  I don't need a dictionary.

I find this to be a very strange argument.  Whereas someone who has an "intense or irrational dislike or fear of people from other countries" might very well be insensitive to their feelings when discussing them, so might anyone else.  Xenophobes drink water too.

As dia rightly points out, in reality you can't become a xenophobe without also being insensitive. Look up the word "rational" when you get done the other two.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 02, 2017, 11:27:09 am
<shrug> And right back at you. From reading your posts I can honestly say you're stupid.

I'm not going to argue immigration in this thread. Suffice to say your 'evidence' is threadbare and often clearly wrong.

Thanks for reinforcing my assessment of the shallowness of immigration supporters. It's not about terrorism or hatred of women and Jews and minorities or economic failure at huge cost to the rest of us, it's about you being able to eat at ethnic restaurants.

And I will honestly conclude, once more as you point out, that whenever you are challenged you immediately resort to childish insults. The die is cast it seems.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 02, 2017, 11:37:21 am
And I will honestly conclude, once more as you point out, that whenever you are challenged you immediately resort to childish insults. The die is cast it seems.

And I can honestly say you have never challenged me. Dia has on occasion. MH has. Cyber has.  Others have. Your self-righteous sniveling is not really what I would call a challenge. That, along with your inability to discuss anything without insults, is why I put you on my ignore list.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest7 on September 02, 2017, 11:39:02 am
As dia rightly points out, in reality you can't become a xenophobe without also being insensitive. Look up the word "rational" when you get done the other two.

You can't without eating and drinking either.  Look up silly.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 02, 2017, 03:58:38 pm
And I can honestly say you have never challenged me. Dia has on occasion. MH has. Cyber has.  Others have. Your self-righteous sniveling is not really what I would call a challenge. That, along with your inability to discuss anything without insults, is why I put you on my ignore list.

Thank you for once again proving my point.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on September 02, 2017, 11:55:59 pm
Don't insult the cool little bouncy thing - I deleted 3 posts from 2 people.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on September 03, 2017, 10:18:09 am
What's the cool bouncy thing?

Do they serve shwarmas?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on September 03, 2017, 11:17:59 am
What's the cool bouncy thing?

Do they serve shwarmas?

Zebedee is from a UK children's show. 

But here we have yet another example of immigrants daring to impose their culture on the rest of us!  He needs a test and deportation, toute suite!

Sorry, Sapper, Canada cannot stand against people from other countries bringing in foreign beliefs and stuff.

Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 03, 2017, 03:55:04 pm
What's the cool bouncy thing?

Do they serve shwarmas?

Yes, but only chicken ones.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: BC_cheque on September 04, 2017, 02:30:41 pm
In response to Hurricane Harvey, seeing lots of posts hectoring Christians for not opening churches during Harvey, hectoring Oil Companies, Republicans, and Texans for denying climate change and now ostensibly experiencing the effects, as well as the "All Cities Matter" meme which tosses the criticism for Black Lives Matter back at the critics.

Seems disunifying and nasty to me.

I'm going to have to disagree on this one.  I think the campaign against Joel Osteen was perfect.  While pretty much every mosque in the Houston had opened its doors, this mega church with seating capacity for 50,000 was lying about being flooded.  It was fantastic to see them being called out on it given that southern christians love to paint themselves as pious while painting all muslims as barbaric.

Same with all the other hypocrisy, from Ted Cruz asking for federal help when he was against it for Hurricane Sandy to the undeniable fact that these 100 year Hurricanes are happening every few years. 

It doesn't seem petty or nasty at all.  It's very fitting. 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on September 04, 2017, 04:50:58 pm
This is a reminder to everyone to avoid personal insults.  There was an offending post that I missed while reading.  The post was pointed out to me.

Omni and SirJohn - I think you should stay away from eachother for a while.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on September 04, 2017, 06:46:46 pm
the undeniable fact that these 100 year Hurricanes are happening every few years.
So what are the chances of 2 people having the same birthday in a room of 30 people? Would you believe 60% https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birthday_problem

Statically speaking 100 year storms will occur somewhere every few years because the math says they should. Once in 100 years implies at a single location - once you expand the scope to include many locations you doing the equivalent of rolling the dice many times so the probably of rolling '100' once increases rapidly.  People who imply is unusual or unexpected to see 100% storms are ideologues who don't know or don't care about math.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 04, 2017, 07:43:20 pm
So what are the chances of 2 people having the same birthday in a room of 30 people? Would you believe 60% https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birthday_problem

Statically speaking 100 year storms will occur somewhere every few years because the math says they should. Once in 100 years implies at a single location - once you expand the scope to include many locations you doing the equivalent of rolling the dice many times so the probably of rolling '100' once increases rapidly.  People who imply is unusual or unexpected to see 100% storms are ideologues who don't know or don't care about math.

Except they continue to occur, not in exactly the same place, but close enough, (such as along the same coast lines) to indicate that GW is undoing the idea of "100 years storms" and will continue to do so if we simply stick our heads in the sand and ignore the science.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/jun/07/us-coastal-flooding-carbon-emissions-study
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 05, 2017, 11:36:48 am
No.  Harder. Yes. Although I would say that you're talking grandparents here, not parents.

But the 'context' in which I brought that up is that the higher number of Black dropouts would most certainly have a strong impact on their employability. Thus it would be completely normal for Black unemployment to be higher, and Black earnings to be lower than that of White or Asian workers.
Is not racism in studies when they use identical resumes and change only the name showing that "black" or "foreign" sounding names get less callbacks despite identical qualifications?

Oh but language skills.

The cover letters and resumes are identical.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on September 05, 2017, 01:53:57 pm

The cover letters and resumes are identical.

Yes but employees kniq that blacks/foreigners don't have good language skills and so they don't call them back.  You have to understand that It is the fault of these people that they are denied the same opportunities and supports that White/European Canadians get.
/s
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on September 05, 2017, 02:40:01 pm
The cover letters and resumes are identical.
Your trouble is you are so fixated on the race question that any time there is data that could have many possible explanations you simply jump to 'racism' because that it suits the ideological narrative which you have constructed. But that does not make it a fact. Resume screening by it nature will be petty and arbitrary. If you spent enough time you could probably find any number of weird correlations. For example, people with names that start with 'A' may get called back more often than people whose name start with 'Z' but we  don't know if that is true because no one has an incentive to go look for such associations. Even the definition of 'foreign sounding' is vague. A ideologically motivated researcher could probably manipulate the results but carefully selecting which names which produce the desired correlation while leaving those 'foreign' names out that do not show the correlation.

And don't bother going on rant about the scientific method and peer reviewed research because that not enough. I always look at how knowledge is claimed and if the techniques used to claim knowledge are easy for a motivated researcher to manipulate then any conclusions are suspect. I have seen too many examples or so called "professional" academics engaging in bad science because it is convenient for their careers to accept any such claims at face value - even when would like the claims to be true.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 05, 2017, 03:41:57 pm
Is not racism in studies when they use identical resumes and change only the name showing that "black" or "foreign" sounding names get less callbacks despite identical qualifications?

Oh but language skills.

The cover letters and resumes are identical.

I've never said that racism does not exist. Although I believe it's mostly the wrong term in the case of employment. I think prejudice is more proper. However, if you look at overall statistics, which is what I was responding to, you have to take the lower level of Black education into account.

In the case where identical resumes show a trend to hiring the white guy it'd be interesting to see into the hearts of those who made the decisions. I don't think it's racism so much as prejudice based on popular cultural beliefs regarding Blacks, esp Black men. Those include criminality, laziness and lack of reliability. Or just people hiring those who look and act like them. Black owned firms or firms with Black hiring managers tend to hire more Blacks. Asians more Asians.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 07, 2017, 09:56:17 pm
Your trouble is you are so fixated on the race question that any time there is data that could have many possible explanations you simply jump to 'racism' because that it suits the ideological narrative which you have constructed. But that does not make it a fact. Resume screening by it nature will be petty and arbitrary. If you spent enough time you could probably find any number of weird correlations. For example, people with names that start with 'A' may get called back more often than people whose name start with 'Z' but we  don't know if that is true because no one has an incentive to go look for such associations. Even the definition of 'foreign sounding' is vague. A ideologically motivated researcher could probably manipulate the results but carefully selecting which names which produce the desired correlation while leaving those 'foreign' names out that do not show the correlation.

And don't bother going on rant about the scientific method and peer reviewed research because that not enough. I always look at how knowledge is claimed and if the techniques used to claim knowledge are easy for a motivated researcher to manipulate then any conclusions are suspect. I have seen too many examples or so called "professional" academics engaging in bad science because it is convenient for their careers to accept any such claims at face value - even when would like the claims to be true.
This is all a very convenient way for you to wear your confirmation bias like a badge of honour. If academics and research disagree with you, then you think the research is flawed. Never mind actually proving or substantiating those flaws. Yet, you'll hold up "good" research as long as it agrees with your position. This is the kind of nonsense you've been doing for years to push your ideological agendas. It's not insightful nor interesting. It's just tedious, like talking to a child who keeps asking "why?"
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 07, 2017, 09:57:05 pm
SirJohn, there's a difference between discrimination/prejudice and racism.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Queefer Sutherland on September 07, 2017, 11:27:23 pm
Your trouble is you are so fixated on the race question that any time there is data that could have many possible explanations you simply jump to 'racism' because that it suits the ideological narrative which you have constructed. But that does not make it a fact. Resume screening by it nature will be petty and arbitrary. If you spent enough time you could probably find any number of weird correlations. For example, people with names that start with 'A' may get called back more often than people whose name start with 'Z' but we  don't know if that is true because no one has an incentive to go look for such associations. Even the definition of 'foreign sounding' is vague. A ideologically motivated researcher could probably manipulate the results but carefully selecting which names which produce the desired correlation while leaving those 'foreign' names out that do not show the correlation.

If the only variable is the names being changed, seems very likely racism is the culprit.  I have family members who would rather hire white ppl than non-white, all other things being equal.  They're racists, & I know this because I know the things they say.  It's amazing how many people middle-aged and older are racist, and it happens in every race because a fair amount of people tend to prefer their own kind, which is why in a place like the GTA you have entire cities dominated by a single minority group. But since white ppl are the majority & have the most hiring power, well they're at an advantage in the grand scale.

Tell me, if Argus was hiring and he had a white sounding name and an Arab/Muslim sounding name & everything else on the resume was exactly the same, who would he call? Enough people like this exist to make a statistically significant difference. Case closed.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on September 08, 2017, 12:59:03 am
If the only variable is the names being changed, seems very likely racism is the culprit.
Who says it is race? It could the specific letters or the sound. Advertisers spend a lot of time creating brands that "sound right". Look at car names which are sometimes constructed words based on the impressions the words leave. I willing to bet someone with the English sounding name 'Donald Duck' might have troubles getting callbacks.

My point is there is no basis to jump to the conclusion that it must be 'systematic racism'. It could be a correlation based on something unrelated.

Quote
I have family members who would rather hire white ppl than non-white, all other things being equal.  They're racists, & I know this because I know the things they say.
I have non-white family members who prefer to hire from their ethnic group and refuse to do business with certain other groups. I know they are racist because I hear what they say. What is your point? Racism exists but I am sick and tired of the 'white privileged'/cult of victim nonsense.  Privilege comes from money - not race.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on September 08, 2017, 08:36:47 am


My point is there is no basis to jump to the conclusion that it must be 'systematic racism'. It could be a correlation based on something unrelated.


Decades of research is not "jumping to conclusions".
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on September 08, 2017, 08:54:01 am


That isn't how these things work. I've lived in Ottawa for almost 40 years. My mother, an uncle and two siblings worked on the Hill. I've been a political junkie since then, when my mother would bring home paper copies of Hansard daily. These things are always phrased in terms of solving dreadful problems (often not proven) and the need to 'protect' the community or members of it, from something politicians don't like.
Let's have some very concrete examples.  At least one, if not more.

Quote
I'm fairly certain things started like this in France and the UK decades ago, which led to laws criminalizing just about any kind of critical public commentary on Islam - along with, of course, any critical, insulting or offensive or derogatory references, even in private, to other people's ethnicity, religion, gender, sexual preference, etc. You can literally go to prison for calling someone an insulting name even in private.
I have read something about that.  People saying things like "I would have killed her colleagues too", "All soldiers should be killed" or making sexually explicit comments about an abducted child  have resulted in arrests.  I agree some of them are questionable arrests, but not all of them. 

Quote
That has not, need I point this out, done a single thing to deter racism or encourage assimilation. France and the UK are as divided by racial and religious animosity as any nations in the West. Race riots are not unusual. They are certainly far more divided than Canada and the US which have no such laws.

I agree, it hasn't.  On the other hand, in Canada, formation of groups to study problems has not resulted in laws that limit free speech.  In a very similar manner, a Parliamentary committee was formed to study anti-semitism in Canada.  This resulted in criticisms that it would make criticism of Isreal illegal.  Sound familiar?  Yet that did not happen.

I think your fears are completely unfounded. 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on September 08, 2017, 09:00:47 am
Decades of research is not "jumping to conclusions".

I will say there is one new study that contradicts the others and says there is no hiring bias.  Even its authors were quick to say it can't be used to draw any conclusions.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on September 08, 2017, 09:21:40 am
I will say there is one new study that contradicts the others and says there is no hiring bias.  Even its authors were quick to say it can't be used to draw any conclusions.

Perhaps this is the first indication the tide has turned and this kind of prejudice is on the way out.  Let's hope additional studies show the same.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on September 08, 2017, 09:21:56 am
This is all a very convenient way for you to wear your confirmation bias like a badge of honour. If academics and research disagree with you, then you think the research is flawed.
A strawman that has no relation with what I said. What is said is I look at HOW science was conducted and if the science uses techniques which I know to be subject to manipulation by motivated researchers I discount it. Any study based on correlation analysis is usually not worth the paper it is written on. It makes no difference whether I like the conclusions or not. You, OTOH, are completely credulous and assume that just because some academic published a study its conclusions must be accepted as fact.

Secondly, when I post links to studies it is not because I believe those studies have any more merit. It is because they are counter examples to whatever narrative is being pushed.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 08, 2017, 09:46:32 am
A strawman that has no relation with what I said. What is said is I look at HOW science was conducted and if the science uses techniques which I know to be subject to manipulation by motivated researchers I discount it. Any study based on correlation analysis is usually not worth the paper it is written on. It makes no difference whether I like the conclusions or not. You, OTOH, are completely credulous and assume that just because some academic published a study its conclusions must be accepted as fact.

Secondly, when I post links to studies it is not because I believe those studies have any more merit. It is because they are counter examples to whatever narrative is being pushed.

Speaking of straw man, you just spent a lot of time and I'm sure effort to confirm cyber's point.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on September 08, 2017, 10:26:50 am
Speaking of straw man, you just spent a lot of time and I'm sure effort to confirm cyber's point.
I sometimes wonder if you are a bot because a human should be better able to read and understand posts.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 08, 2017, 11:34:17 am
I sometimes wonder if you are a bot because a human should be better able to read and understand posts.

I understand bafflegab when I see it.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 08, 2017, 12:14:00 pm
SirJohn, there's a difference between discrimination/prejudice and racism.

Uh, I thought that was what I said...
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 08, 2017, 12:20:33 pm
Tell me, if Argus was hiring and he had a white sounding name and an Arab/Muslim sounding name & everything else on the resume was exactly the same, who would he call? Enough people like this exist to make a statistically significant difference. Case closed.

Another who doesn't even know what racism means but feels free to throw it out there as a blanket condemnation.

Yes, I would call the guy with the white sounding name, but that's not racism. It's experience. First, the guy with the white sounding name probably speaks, reads and writes English pretty well. Second, he was probably born and raised here, which means he's culturally familiar with the rules of behaviour in an office setting. Third, when hiring, I always tried to find people who would fit in with our somewhat unusual office culture. That included asking them how they'd deal with people tossing handfuls of paper clips over the top of their cubicle onto their head. A guy with a 'white sounding' name would probably fit in better. Maybe not, but I'm going with the odds.

By the way, as a slight improvement on your lack of understanding, Arabs are considered Caucasians by the US government when compiling race based data. Some of them have browner skins but many are as white as any British guy.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Goddess on September 08, 2017, 03:43:29 pm

 Third, when hiring, I always tried to find people who would fit in with our somewhat unusual office culture. That included asking them how they'd deal with people tossing handfuls of paper clips over the top of their cubicle onto their head. A guy with a 'white sounding' name would probably fit in better. Maybe not, but I'm going with the odds.



Haha!  Sounds like a great place to work.

Would you hire me?  I'm a girl, though.  ;)

Maybe more like a wirl - half woman, half girl.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: BC_cheque on September 08, 2017, 03:48:44 pm
Another who doesn't even know what racism means but feels free to throw it out there as a blanket condemnation.

Yes, I would call the guy with the white sounding name, but that's not racism. It's experience. First, the guy with the white sounding name probably speaks, reads and writes English pretty well. Second, he was probably born and raised here, which means he's culturally familiar with the rules of behaviour in an office setting. Third, when hiring, I always tried to find people who would fit in with our somewhat unusual office culture. That included asking them how they'd deal with people tossing handfuls of paper clips over the top of their cubicle onto their head. A guy with a 'white sounding' name would probably fit in better. Maybe not, but I'm going with the odds.

By the way, as a slight improvement on your lack of understanding, Arabs are considered Caucasians by the US government when compiling race based data. Some of them have browner skins but many are as white as any British guy.

And this breaks my heart to hear because I know my resume has ended up in a lot of recycling boxes even though I grew up in Canada, speak unaccented English better than I speak any other language and I'm every bit as 'culturally familiar' with your office quirks as any Becky Smith. 

But you probably wouldn't call me.... and we both lose.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Queefer Sutherland on September 08, 2017, 05:20:52 pm
Another who doesn't even know what racism means but feels free to throw it out there as a blanket condemnation.

Yes, I would call the guy with the white sounding name, but that's not racism. It's experience. First, the guy with the white sounding name probably speaks, reads and writes English pretty well. Second, he was probably born and raised here, which means he's culturally familiar with the rules of behaviour in an office setting. Third, when hiring, I always tried to find people who would fit in with our somewhat unusual office culture. That included asking them how they'd deal with people tossing handfuls of paper clips over the top of their cubicle onto their head. A guy with a 'white sounding' name would probably fit in better. Maybe not, but I'm going with the odds.

We can bicker semantics, but you're still confirming my point to TimG.  Discrimination based on race/ethnicity is still very much alive and well.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Queefer Sutherland on September 08, 2017, 05:38:51 pm
I have non-white family members who prefer to hire from their ethnic group and refuse to do business with certain other groups. I know they are racist because I hear what they say. What is your point? Racism exists but I am sick and tired of the 'white privileged'/cult of victim nonsense.  Privilege comes from money - not race.

My point, as I already stated, is that people are racist, which includes all races, and since whites are the majority & also have the most hiring power, that means non-whites will generally suffer the most from racist hiring policies.

I don't care what you're sick of hearing.  As conservative Ben Shapiro says:  facts don't care about your feelings.  Privilege comes from race & money along with other factors.  For the record, I'm also sick of the over-victimization minority groups put out there.  They take all personal responsibility away from the equation & blame all their problems on the "privileged groups" (aka white straight cis rich able-bodied males), which is wrong.  But that doesn't mean certain points of racism or sexism doesn't exist.  Yes racism exists, yes it sucks, but rich white men didn't ie: force the relatively high # of black women who let their bf insert his unprotected **** inside their **** & get knocked up when they were 16 because they're an idiot, drop out of high school, get hooked on drugs, & live off welfare or work low-paying jobs for the rest of their lives.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 08, 2017, 06:04:50 pm
We can bicker semantics, but you're still confirming my point to TimG.  Discrimination based on race/ethnicity is still very much alive and well.

It's not based on race or ethnicity except on being Canadian.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 08, 2017, 06:18:47 pm
And this breaks my heart to hear because I know my resume has ended up in a lot of recycling boxes even though I grew up in Canada, speak unaccented English better than I speak any other language and I'm every bit as 'culturally familiar' with your office quirks as any Becky Smith. 

But you probably wouldn't call me.... and we both lose.

Maybe, but the way it usually worked with us was someone who worked there knew someone... It was not an all-white workplace. However, most of the people who worked there did mostly seem to know white people - mostly French, mind you (government). We preferred not to hire complete strangers unless someone could vouch for them. It was too hard to get rid of them afterward if they turned out to be PITAs.

There were a number of immigrants in the directorate (mainly Asian) and many of them presented their own cultural issues which caused a variety of problems. It was just less of a headache to go with Canadian born, and since you often couldn't tell on resumes unless they made it fairly clear - ie, went to high school from 2001-2005 at Canada High, etc.

Where we mostly hired minorities were in the big pools. You got to interview more people without commitment there, and we could spend a few days interviewing people to try and get a feel for their personality. And personality is a big deal. We assume, by the time we get to the interview stage they can do the job or they wouldn't have passed the tests. So the personality thing is the main factor in hiring.

Your statement is kind of like the argument I've had over immigration where people say many of the immigrants from certain areas make fine immigrants, are culturally adaptable, fit in well and prosper. And my response is, yes, I know. But the odds of that happening are simply much higher from certain other regions, and I'm going with the odds. And yes, that's unfair to individuals from regions we might  ignore. But I feel it's more important, to be fair to Canada,  to get the best immigrants. In this case it was important to get the best employees.

Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 08, 2017, 06:41:27 pm
Haha!  Sounds like a great place to work.

Would you hire me?  I'm a girl, though.  ;)

Maybe more like a wirl - half woman, half girl.

Alas, my days of sitting in on interviews is done now that I work for myself and have only myself to deal with. That unit eventually broke up, btw, because, in large part, we let the wrong employee join. They were doing drugs, and when we tried to get rid of her she launched a complaint for harassment against the whole unit. Because senior management were complete cowards they decided not to toss her complaint but hired an outside investigator who spent months poking around and eventually found there was no substance to them. Unfortunately, they also found a lot of our behavior 'inappropriate', apparently because we joked around a lot at work rather than being good little robots.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on September 08, 2017, 06:57:28 pm
facts don't care about your feelings.  Privilege comes from race & money along with other factors.
Except that is not fact. It is your opinion. A poor white person does have any special privilege. They face the disadvantages when it comes to accessing education and job opportunities. They often experience the same toxic family dysfunction that are associated with poor minorities.  The face stereotyping as 'welfare bums' or 'white trash' like any minority. Trying to dismiss these people as not important because they happen to share skin tone with wealthy members of society is just wrong.

But this is a bigger reason why harping on 'white privilege' only exacerbates the problem: very few people believe they are privileged even if you browbeat them into saying the words. This creates resentment and anger which increases social divisions rather than healing them.

Anyone who cares about the issues should focus on wealth privilege because most people can understand that there are those with less money than they have. This creates a basis for positive action rather than simply increasing divisions.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Queefer Sutherland on September 08, 2017, 08:44:03 pm
Except that is not fact. It is your opinion. A poor white person does have any special privilege. They face the disadvantages when it comes to accessing education and job opportunities. They often experience the same toxic family dysfunction that are associated with poor minorities.  The face stereotyping as 'welfare bums' or 'white trash' like any minority. Trying to dismiss these people as not important because they happen to share skin tone with wealthy members of society is just wrong.

Take a poor white person from a dysfunctional family who  likes to smoke weed everyday vs a poor black or Arab/Muslim person from a dysfunctional family who looks likes they smoke weed everyday.  Who is more likely to get a call back for a job?

Now I agree that when we look at all the "intersectional" victim groups, poverty is very rarely looked at, and that's wrong.  University admissions doesn't look at family wealth/income, which is BS if they consider things like race & gender etc.

Quote
But this is a bigger reason why harping on 'white privilege' only exacerbates the problem: very few people believe they are privileged even if you browbeat them into saying the words. This creates resentment and anger which increases social divisions rather than healing them.

Anyone who cares about the issues should focus on wealth privilege because most people can understand that there are those with less money than they have. This creates a basis for positive action rather than simply increasing divisions.

I 100% absolutely agree with you here.  To add, the vast majority of SJW people only focus on "white privilege" and dismiss other things like poverty, abuse/upbringing, & personal responsibility for making crappy life choices.  I agree it's created a HUGE amount of resentment among the "victim groups" towards the "evil oppressors", which only makes things worse.  That doesn't mean that certain advantages based on race or gender etc don't exist in certain circumstances though.  I don't agree with these nutty SJW, but I also don't agree with opinions like yours which dismiss this entirely.  There's a middle-ground where all factors need to be considered.  But once emotions get into the mix, people get their backs up & it becomes personal since it's tied to one's identity.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 08, 2017, 09:26:03 pm
A strawman that has no relation with what I said. What is said is I look at HOW science was conducted and if the science uses techniques which I know to be subject to manipulation by motivated researchers I discount it. Any study based on correlation analysis is usually not worth the paper it is written on. It makes no difference whether I like the conclusions or not. You, OTOH, are completely credulous and assume that just because some academic published a study its conclusions must be accepted as fact.

Secondly, when I post links to studies it is not because I believe those studies have any more merit. It is because they are counter examples to whatever narrative is being pushed.
The funny thing is you reject academic peer review, that is research being reviewed by the most educated people in a given field, people who dedicate their life to their area of study. You reject their process of vetting the quality of studies in favour of your own uneducated analysis of the studies in question. It's pretty tough to find any credibility in your opinions when they contradict the experts over and over again. In other words, I'll take my doctor's opinion about my health over your opinion and I'll take an environmental scientist doctor's opinion about the environment over yours too.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: BC_cheque on September 08, 2017, 11:28:38 pm
It's not based on race or ethnicity except on being Canadian.

Your statement is kind of like the argument I've had over immigration where people say many of the immigrants from certain areas make fine immigrants, are culturally adaptable, fit in well and prosper. And my response is, yes, I know. But the odds of that happening are simply much higher from certain other regions, and I'm going with the odds. And yes, that's unfair to individuals from regions we might  ignore. But I feel it's more important, to be fair to Canada,  to get the best immigrants. In this case it was important to get the best employees.

So wait, let's see if I got this straight.

It's not about race, it's about Canadian-ness... but you have preconceived ideas (aka prejudices) about people from certain countries that they would likely be less Canadian... but in your mind that is NOT racism?

Are you kidding, that's exactly what racism is.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on September 09, 2017, 07:10:09 am
Take a poor white person from a dysfunctional family who  likes to smoke weed everyday vs a poor black or Arab/Muslim person from a dysfunctional family who looks likes they smoke weed everyday.  Who is more likely to get a call back for a job?
And how important is a 'callback' when most jobs are found via interpersonal connections? And even for the minority of jobs which rely on resume filtering, how many of those would be open to 'white trash'? Poverty is the elephant in the room. Even if one could establish that race related factors were a factor that does not mean they are the dominate or even a significant factor. Yet that is all we talk about. This is a problem.

It is also worth noting that I already live in the Canada of the near future where the vast majority of businesses in Richmond are owned by non-whites who feel none of the "white guilt" that drives the SJWs and happily restrict hiring to ethnically desirable groups. There are many stores  in shopping malls where you will never see a non-Asian employee. How does whinging about "white privilege" help anyone in Richmond?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on September 09, 2017, 07:22:41 am
The funny thing is you reject academic peer review, that is research being reviewed by the most educated people in a given field, people who dedicate their life to their area of study.
ROTFL. The problem with people 'dedicating their life' to a field is they have a vested interest in ensuring the field continues to be relevant and attracts funding from government. This creates a huge incentive to tweak any research in ways that maximumize funding opportunities even if this means abandoning the principles of science in the process. A good example is the field of 'dendrochronology' where all people working in the field conveniently ignore the stuff they should have learned in Statistics 101 and do correlation analyses after they have removed any samples from their dataset that do not show the desired relationship. They will obviously invent absurd post hoc rationalizations for their sample selection that help to hide the problem but if they actually followed the process that they should follow they would have to admit their data is garbage and tells us nothing useful. This would mean they have nothing to write papers about and their field would disappear.

I also find it ironic that you conflate professionals like doctors that can be sued and lose the right to practice for providing bad medical advice and academics protected by tenure that face no consequences for peddling junk as long as their "peers" find the junk useful in their quest for more funding.

IOW, you have absolutely no justification for claiming that word of any self-proclaimed expert should be accepted with question. If someone is an expert they should be able to show that their ideas are supported by evidence that is not easily subjected to manipulation by motivated researchers. If they can't their their expertise does not mean much.
 

Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on September 09, 2017, 09:31:13 am
Another who doesn't even know what racism means but feels free to throw it out there as a blanket condemnation.

This is racism:

Quote
Yes, I would call the guy with the white sounding name, but that's not racism. It's experience. First, the guy with the white sounding name probably speaks, reads and writes English pretty well. Second, he was probably born and raised here, which means he's culturally familiar with the rules of behaviour in an office setting.  Maybe not, but I'm going with the odds.

In effect, you are saying:  "Sure, somebody from a non-European background might be a great employee, but I have already made up my mind that they wouldn't be because they are from a non-European background".   It's really no different than saying "Yes, some blacks might be great but I have already made up my mind that they are sub-human because they are black."



 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 09, 2017, 11:41:37 am
So wait, let's see if I got this straight.

It's not about race, it's about Canadian-ness... but you have preconceived ideas (aka prejudices) about people from certain countries that they would likely be less Canadian... but in your mind that is NOT racism?

Are you kidding, that's exactly what racism is.

Because I have 'preconceived' ideas about people from other countries being less Canadian that's racism? Seriously?

People from other countries ARE less Canadian by definition. Regardless of their race. Americans are less Canadian than Canadians. So are Ukrainians and Italians. If I go and live in Russia and they sell me a passport I still won't be very Russian. I won't speak the language as well, and won't embrace or understand the culture as well as the native born, and will retain a lot of the values, beliefs and behaviours I was raised with in Canada.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 09, 2017, 11:50:01 am
This is racism:

In effect, you are saying:  "Sure, somebody from a non-European background might be a great employee, but I have already made up my mind that they wouldn't be because they are from a non-European background".   It's really no different than saying "Yes, some blacks might be great but I have already made up my mind that they are sub-human because they are black."

No it's simply not. And that's a gross exaggeration of my point. My preference for 'European sounding names' is simply based on the reality that most adults from the third world are immigrants. Not that they might be different colours. And I prefer the odds of getting a Canadian born person who is of a similar mindset to the group to the odds of finding someone from Nigeria or Egypt or India or Columbia who will fit in. Time is money and I had lots to do. So keep it simple, hire someone and move on.

Now the government's formal hiring practices are specifically designed to preclude my sort of behaviour. I'm sure that you will find that reassuring. They are mind-numbingly complex, horrifyingly time-consuming, and so devoted to being fair to prospective employees they are a huge problem for efficient operations. We tended to short-circuit them wherever possible simply because of how stunningly inefficient they were at finding employees. If we needed a new clerk we needed him or her NOW, not in 14 months.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: kimmy on September 09, 2017, 11:50:27 am
Because I have 'preconceived' ideas about people from other countries being less Canadian that's racism? Seriously?

People from other countries ARE less Canadian by definition. Regardless of their race. Americans are less Canadian than Canadians. So are Ukrainians and Italians. If I go and live in Russia and they sell me a passport I still won't be very Russian. I won't speak the language as well, and won't embrace or understand the culture as well as the native born, and will retain a lot of the values, beliefs and behaviours I was raised with in Canada.

Becky Chang could be a 4th generation Canadian, and Becky Smith might have got off a plane from Jamaica yesterday.  Names alone are of pretty limited value in trying to guess anything.

But any resume you're looking at will have far more information to make an educated guess at someone's background, so this really isn't a very realistic question.

 -k
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on September 09, 2017, 11:52:47 am
Because I have 'preconceived' ideas about people from other countries being less Canadian that's racism? Seriously?

People from other countries ARE less Canadian by definition. Regardless of their race. Americans are less Canadian than Canadians. So are Ukrainians and Italians. If I go and live in Russia and they sell me a passport I still won't be very Russian. I won't speak the language as well, and won't embrace or understand the culture as well as the native born, and will retain a lot of the values, beliefs and behaviours I was raised with in Canada.

Your 'preconceived' notions are the exact definition of racism because they impact how valuable you consider them to be.  Your "preconceive" them to be less valuable than domestically-born Canadians in terms of economic viability, employees, neighbors and citizens. 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 09, 2017, 11:55:20 am
Becky Chang could be a 4th generation Canadian, and Becky Smith might have got off a plane from Jamaica yesterday.  Names alone are of pretty limited value in trying to guess anything.

But any resume you're looking at will have far more information to make an educated guess at someone's background, so this really isn't a very realistic question.

 -k

No but it was the question posed. I did mention that you could sometimes check to see if they went to high school in Canada. And the odds are Becky Chang is an immigrant. We only opened up immigration to the third world in the late seventies, and things really only started going full steam in the mid 1980s after Mulroney tripled immigration.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 09, 2017, 11:59:11 am
Your 'preconceived' notions are the exact definition of racism because they impact how valuable you consider them to be.  Your "preconceive" them to be less valuable than domestically-born Canadians in terms of economic viability, employees, neighbors and citizens.

They WERE less valuable than domestically born Canadians in terms of their likely value to the smooth running and efficiency of the group and its personality.  And that is not based on race, so therefore can't be racist. If I did an interview with a blonde guy who had come from say Ukraine a few years back I'd have had a lot of doubts about hiring him too. On the other hand, an Asian girl who dressed, acted and sounded Canadian would give me no such pause. Needless to say a blonde girl in a burqua would not have been hired by me. Then again, a blonde dressed like a nun with a big cross dangling from her neck wouldn't be hired by me either. The person before me hired a woman who was a JW and she caused no end of problems.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on September 09, 2017, 12:07:14 pm
Becky Chang could be a 4th generation Canadian, and Becky Smith might have got off a plane from Jamaica yesterday.  Names alone are of pretty limited value in trying to guess anything.


 -k

Yep. In the last week, I've had two experiences which I think illustrate just how wrong Argus SirJohn is.   The first was in dealing with someone in a retail store, who was clearly not of "White-European" descent.  He spoke perfect 'Canadian", without even an accent.  I came to find out that he had a 'foreign' first and last name, and that he'd come to Canada when he was about 10 years old.   

Second experience:  I had reason to talk to someone on the phone yesterday with a 'Canadian' first name - based on my own prejudices, he sounded like a 'white', European-descent Canadian, about 5'8" tall, blonde or light brown hair, mid-to-late 20s.   After the phone call, I learned he has a 'foreign' last name and speaks a foreign language fluently.   So, very unlikely to be as I imagined him from his English-speaking ability.   

SirJohn would have missed out on both of these people who demonstrated excellent verbal skills, intelligence, customer service and 'smarts', because if he'd seen their name on a resume, he would have made unfounded assumptions about them and gone for someone with a 'Canadian' name.  And I'm guessing that when weighting resumes, the assumption of poor English and lack of cultural fit based on a *name* could easily result in hiring someone of lesser calibre to fill a role.  So much for 'merit-based' hiring, eh?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 09, 2017, 12:31:51 pm
SirJohn would have missed out on both of these people who demonstrated excellent verbal skills, intelligence, customer service and 'smarts', because if he'd seen their name on a resume,

Yes, but the odds say otherwise. I would have gone with the odds. "missing out" on one person doesn't mean you don't hire someone equally talented.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 09, 2017, 12:54:24 pm
No it's simply not. And that's a gross exaggeration of my point. My preference for 'European sounding names' is simply based on the reality that most adults from the third world are immigrants. Not that they might be different colours. And I prefer the odds of getting a Canadian born person who is of a similar mindset to the group to the odds of finding someone from Nigeria or Egypt or India or Columbia who will fit in. Time is money and I had lots to do. So keep it simple, hire someone and move on.

Now the government's formal hiring practices are specifically designed to preclude my sort of behaviour. I'm sure that you will find that reassuring. They are mind-numbingly complex, horrifyingly time-consuming, and so devoted to being fair to prospective employees they are a huge problem for efficient operations. We tended to short-circuit them wherever possible simply because of how stunningly inefficient they were at finding employees. If we needed a new clerk we needed him or her NOW, not in 14 months.

So you chuck the idea of fairness in lieu of hastening the process. I'm glad you ever worked for my company.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on September 09, 2017, 01:04:09 pm
Yes, but the odds say otherwise. I would have gone with the odds. "missing out" on one person doesn't mean you don't hire someone equally talented.

True, but by the same token you can't claim you have hired the most suitable when you refuse to consider someone based on their "name".   


Now the government's formal hiring practices are specifically designed to preclude my sort of behaviour. I'm sure that you will find that reassuring. They are mind-numbingly complex, horrifyingly time-consuming, and so devoted to being fair to prospective employees they are a huge problem for efficient operations. We tended to short-circuit them wherever possible simply because of how stunningly inefficient they were at finding employees. If we needed a new clerk we needed him or her NOW, not in 14 months.


Oh look, being fair and avoiding racist and xenophobic hiring practices is a problem.   

Now, I agree that the hiring practices within government could use improvement in terms of agility, but I consider that preferable to allowing practices that you engaged in becoming common.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 09, 2017, 02:42:20 pm
So you chuck the idea of fairness in lieu of hastening the process. I'm glad you ever worked for my company.

I'm quite certain efficient employees are an oddity in your company.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 09, 2017, 02:50:14 pm
True, but by the same token you can't claim you have hired the most suitable when you refuse to consider someone based on their "name".

I couldn't claim to hire the most suitable in any case. There's always a better applicant out there somewhere. I hire people who fit in and do the job well and that's good enough.

Quote
Oh look, being fair and avoiding racist and xenophobic hiring practices is a problem.

It's not racist or xenophobic. I've already patiently explained why this to you.   

Quote
Now, I agree that the hiring practices within government could use improvement in terms of agility, but I consider that preferable to allowing practices that you engaged in becoming common.

Right. Which is why your type should never be in charge of anything. Given the choice between System A, which is unfair to some people outside the section/department, and System B, which is less unfair but costs twenty times more and takes fifty times longer, you'll go with System B and drown everyone in paperwork and red tape while slowing the efficiency of the unit due to lack of employees.

In point of fact, I could have simply interviewed everyone whose resume qualified, but the rules for term and temporary employees only allowed a couple of interviews, and everyone had the right to appeal once they had gotten to that stage if they weren't hired. That meant more paperwork to justify decisions on hiring, especially if the person turned down was some sort of minority and especially when much of the reason was a difficult-to-describe assessment of 'best fit' for the unit. For example, I once hired the person with the least amount of experience, according to his resume, because I wanted someone for a low level job who wouldn't be immediately using the position as a ladder to find better work - which was always a problem for us. Language was also an issue. If they passed the test which said they were bilingual but they were hard for us to understand, well, I can't use that because the test says they're bilingual. Hell, some Francophones were hard for the Francophones to understand, especially if they came from places like Shawinigan. And then we had Ontario Francophones who were allowed to take the test in English, which they spoke fluently, but their French was horrific.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 09, 2017, 02:54:24 pm
So you chuck the idea of fairness in lieu of hastening the process. I'm glad you ever worked for my company.
It's not fair to single him out when this is often times an unconscious thing that's done nearly everywhere. SirJohn is rationalizing it, but it's still a barrier people face due to their ethnicity or race and that's the important point.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 09, 2017, 03:00:21 pm
It's not fair to single him out when this is often times an unconscious thing that's done nearly everywhere. SirJohn is rationalizing it, but it's still a barrier people face due to their ethnicity or race and that's the important point.

It's done, I think, because no compromise is accepted, at least in government. The burden of paperwork, meetings, arguments with HR, justifications of competition questions and criteria, appeals and feedback, for a unit which is already short staffed is enormous. Combine that with the fact it can easily take well over a year and everyone takes short cuts if they can get away with it. And not just at the entry level.

I went through considerable efforts to bring in three young women once, one who was a friend of an existing employee, one of which we met hiring as a temp, and the third through a term process. Then I lost all three to directors within two months because the AS1 process HR had spent 18 months on and from which we all hoped would result in a pool of about 50 people, wound up with a pool of 4. Finding employees in the government is a crushingly bureaucratic and time-consuming process specifically because of the HR determination for "fairness" to all applicants. There is no interest, of course, in fairness to the hiring department.

The directors, given their greater clout, then arranged to hire all three permanently (I had brought them in as terms) without competition.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 09, 2017, 03:14:12 pm
I'm quite certain efficient employees are an oddity in your company.

Apparently not since it has become the biggest on the planet at what it does.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 09, 2017, 03:19:15 pm
And the point is that the shortcuts unfairly limit the opportunities people from different racial and ethnic backgrounds have in a way that a white person with a "Canadian" sounding name doesn't face. It's not about their skills or ability when you're tossing the resumes before even offering an interview. It's not about their skills or abilities when you see an Arab sitting across from you and he makes you uncomfortable because you associate him with terrorists. The point is that these are barriers people face through no fault of their own. This is what we are talking about when we say "white privilege." It's not some mythical thing. It's an observable pattern of barriers faced by people of colour, women, differently-abled people, LGBTQ people, etc. It's not to make you feel guilty that you're "privileged," it's to make you recognize that there's barriers that are far from their control and that people not from those backgrounds, namely straight white men, can be completely unaware of because hey never have to face them. That's the privilege; it's the privilege of living a normal life.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 09, 2017, 03:20:15 pm
It's not fair to single him out when this is often times an unconscious thing that's done nearly everywhere. SirJohn is rationalizing it, but it's still a barrier people face due to their ethnicity or race and that's the important point.

My question is, is it fair to excuse xenophobia simply by labeling it "unconscious"? Somehow I don't believe people engage in it without knowing it and so I think they instead try to somehow rationalize it.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 09, 2017, 03:30:30 pm
My question is, is it fair to excuse xenophobia simply by labeling it "unconscious"? Somehow I don't believe people engage in it without knowing it and so I think they instead try to somehow rationalize it.
I disagree with you. The problem with systematic racism is that people don't need to think about it. The insidiousness is that the majority group can go completely unaware of the barriers faced by others because the majority themselves don't face them. There's a distinction to be made against bigots and their personal face-to-face discrimination and prejudice and systemic racism that stems from a society built without consideration for others.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 09, 2017, 03:54:18 pm
And the point is that the shortcuts unfairly limit the opportunities people from different racial and ethnic backgrounds have in a way that a white person with a "Canadian" sounding name doesn't face.

Perhaps so. On the other hand, studies have shown this preference for similar people is not confined to white anglos. Francophones tend to hire Francophones. Blacks hire Blacks. Asians hire Asians. Most people are more comfortable with those who are much like we are.

And the presumption most of those with foreign names are foreigners will fade away in any event since there are now an awful lot of Canadian born people with 'foreign names'. And more every year.

Quote
The point is that these are barriers people face through no fault of their own. This is what we are talking about when we say "white privilege." It's not some mythical thing.

People are human, and at least a lot of the barriers in place, at least in Canada, is due to so many people immigrating here in such a short time with so little grasp of the language or culture, and an encouragement from government to take pride in who and what they are and not cast it aside. Communication skills are a HUGE issue in areas like I worked and foreigners often do not possess them to the extent needed. "Taxi driver English" is simply not acceptable when dealing with complex software and regulatory issues.

Quote
It's not to make you feel guilty that you're "privileged," it's to make you recognize that there's barriers that are far from their control and that people not from those backgrounds, namely straight white men, can be completely unaware of because hey never have to face them. That's the privilege; it's the privilege of living a normal life.

I don't doubt someone new to Canada is going to be at a disadvantage to me. Are you saying they shouldn't be? Are we to deny any advantage, however natural, to those born and raised here?

Anyone who is new to a country is going to face challenges, and should expect to. They won't have the connections and the local knowledge. As you're aware most good jobs are never advertised outside a firm or department. They don't need to be. People who work there almost always know someone. If you're an immigrant you don't have those connections. Hell, if you come here from Vancouver you won't have those connections either.

The government puts a lot of effort into short circuiting the hiring process in order to be fair to all applicants, but the result is a bureaucratic mess which is unfair to the actual government itself. Now the government can afford to have a hideously expensive bureaucracy which slows down hiring to a snails pace, and takes up masses of managers' time, but private industry cannot.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 09, 2017, 04:15:16 pm
I disagree with you. The problem with systematic racism is that people don't need to think about it. The insidiousness is that the majority group can go completely unaware of the barriers faced by others because the majority themselves don't face them. There's a distinction to be made against bigots and their personal face-to-face discrimination and prejudice and systemic racism that stems from a society built without consideration for others.

Well I grew up in about as pasty white a community as you could imagine until in my late teens I moved to the "big smoke" (the Beaches area of TO) and found myself in the company of a lot of people who didn't look like me. I was certainly aware of concept of racism, but I chose not to go down that road. I can't see how I could have chosen otherwise without knowing it. Systemic racism is no less racism than any other type. 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Queefer Sutherland on September 09, 2017, 09:04:21 pm
. Even if one could establish that race related factors were a factor that does not mean they are the dominate or even a significant factor. Yet that is all we talk about. This is a problem.

I agree.

Quote
It is also worth noting that I already live in the Canada of the near future where the vast majority of businesses in Richmond are owned by non-whites who feel none of the "white guilt" that drives the SJWs and happily restrict hiring to ethnically desirable groups. There are many stores  in shopping malls where you will never see a non-Asian employee. How does whinging about "white privilege" help anyone in Richmond?

I'm sure that's true, it should be investigated & called out as racial discrimination with criminal implications.  Yes there's Asian privilege too, "privilege" is unearned advantage due to some kind of BS.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Queefer Sutherland on September 09, 2017, 09:06:53 pm
So wait, let's see if I got this straight.

It's not about race, it's about Canadian-ness... but you have preconceived ideas (aka prejudices) about people from certain countries that they would likely be less Canadian... but in your mind that is NOT racism?

Are you kidding, that's exactly what racism is.

I think for SirJohn it's a lot more about culture than race.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 09, 2017, 09:14:52 pm
I think for SirJohn it's a lot more about culture than race.

I think you've got that completely back asswards. Argus's comments tend to be mostly about race and indicate he thinks that other races are unable to integrate with North American culture which is completely untrue. 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 09, 2017, 09:55:54 pm
I don't doubt someone new to Canada is going to be at a disadvantage to me. Are you saying they shouldn't be? Are we to deny any advantage, however natural, to those born and raised here?

Anyone who is new to a country is going to face challenges, and should expect to. They won't have the connections and the local knowledge. As you're aware most good jobs are never advertised outside a firm or department. They don't need to be. People who work there almost always know someone. If you're an immigrant you don't have those connections. Hell, if you come here from Vancouver you won't have those connections either.

And then you argue they shouldn't even be allowed here, posting surveys about how difficult it is for them to find work when first arriving. Yet you seem to understand their context quite well and ignore how well they're doing 5 and 10 years on.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 10, 2017, 02:17:39 pm
I think you've got that completely back asswards. Argus's comments tend to be mostly about race and indicate he thinks that other races are unable to integrate with North American culture which is completely untrue.

My comments on immigration are NEVER about race,
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 10, 2017, 02:20:54 pm
And then you argue they shouldn't even be allowed here, posting surveys about how difficult it is for them to find work when first arriving. Yet you seem to understand their context quite well and ignore how well they're doing 5 and 10 years on.

They're NOT doing well 5 and 10 years on. That's the point. And I don't say no one should come. I say that immigration is, in essence, like recruiting employees. You have people from one college which generally, according to your experience, tend to perform poorly at your business, and others, from another college, which have a much greater tendency to shine. Why does it not stand to reason you should try to recruit as many people as possible from that latter college, and bypass the former? Especially when, once you hire them, you can't ever fire them.

I'm sure there are some bright people at Carleton, but if I had a chance to recruit as many people as I wanted from Oxford, Cambridge and MIT I'd probably prefer to do that.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 10, 2017, 02:30:50 pm
My comments on immigration are NEVER about race, so you're as full of **** as usual.

OMG, surely you jest. It's either race or it's insults when you get challenged on the comments. 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 10, 2017, 02:33:39 pm
OMG, surely you jest. It's either race or it's insults when you get challenged on the comments.

Prove it.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on September 10, 2017, 02:50:47 pm
Prove it.

You make hyperbolic and insulting statements about groups you dislike in topic titles and throughout your posts.  Just because you are referring to a 'group' doesn't make what you are saying any less of an insult.  You don't call "ideas" stupid, you call "people" stupid.  You are one of the most consistently insulting people I've ever seen on a forum.   

You claim you wan't 'rational' discussion, but when you open topics with insults and litter more insults through almost every post you make, you aren't looking for rational discussion.   I am not sure if you are lying to yourself or if you just think you are so much cleverer than everyone else they won't notice.   
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 10, 2017, 03:05:30 pm
You make hyperbolic and insulting statements about groups you dislike in topic titles and throughout your posts.  Just because you are referring to a 'group' doesn't make what you are saying any less of an insult.  You don't call "ideas" stupid, you call "people" stupid.  You are one of the most consistently insulting people I've ever seen on a forum.

I'm never insulting when people make the topic of the conversation about whatever the topic of the conversation is. When they decide their self-righteousness indignation absolutely requires they express their disdain for anyone who has an opinion they dislike - ie, me - then yeah, I tend to express my sad disappointment in what a pathetic lack of maturity and intelligence they possess. Which is why you keep getting slapped down. You're so utterly self-righteous you can't post on any subject without shrilly decrying those who disagree with you.

Might I suggest you get off the internet? Stay home and don't watch TV so you'll be safe from opinions that upset you? A frail, dainty, delicate person like you has no business venturing out into the wild, where opinions aren't  properly filtered and sanitized so they won't offend you.

Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: guest4 on September 10, 2017, 05:41:07 pm
I'm never insulting when people make the topic of the conversation about whatever the topic of the conversation is. When they decide their self-righteousness indignation absolutely requires they express their disdain for anyone who has an opinion they dislike - ie, me - then yeah, I tend to express my sad disappointment in what a pathetic lack of maturity and intelligence they possess.

When you start topics with insults and disdain (great word to describe your style, thanks!), as you so often do, and someone responds in kind - who is the one 'starting' it, hmmm?    If you want rational discourse, you wouldn't post the way you do.   You post stuff to get reaction and then pretend to be all so innocent and righteous when you get the reaction you were aiming for. 

Quote
Which is why you keep getting slapped down.   
You only think you've slapped me down because I so often don't see the point in continuing to exchange barbs so I leave the exchange.   

Like now.  But don't worry, I'll be back.   ;D

Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 10, 2017, 07:22:48 pm

Might I suggest you get off the internet? Stay home and don't watch TV so you'll be safe from opinions that upset you? A frail, dainty, delicate person like you has no business venturing out into the wild, where opinions aren't  properly filtered and sanitized so they won't offend you.

Just the kind of comments that once again proves the point.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 10, 2017, 09:27:11 pm
They're NOT doing well 5 and 10 years on. That's the point. And I don't say no one should come. I say that immigration is, in essence, like recruiting employees.
Recruiting employees, which you've acknowledged is plagued by systemic racism.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on September 10, 2017, 09:42:28 pm
Lets keep the insults down, shall we?
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 10, 2017, 09:59:59 pm
Recruiting employees, which you've acknowledged is plagued by systemic racism.

Again, it's not racism. I'll acknowledge the results might have a  similar effect, but there isn't any intent to keep anyone of a particular race or ethnicity out of a group, but to hire people who will contribute to the group's cohesiveness and efficiency.

In terms of the example I made, I pointed out that a very religious blonde Christian would be no more likely to be hired than a woman in a burqua, and that a Ukrainian with fractured English would be as challenged as an Iranian.

In terms of immigration, the entire reason for the existence of the program is economic. Why, then, would we not recruit the immigrants who are most economically successful? That these immigrants also tend to be from cultures most similar to Canada's is a huge bonus, imho, since I like our culture a lot more than I do the cultures of the majority of our source countries.

Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 10, 2017, 10:19:03 pm
Again, it's not racism. I'll acknowledge the results might have a  similar effect, but there isn't any intent to keep anyone of a particular race or ethnicity out of a group, but to hire people who will contribute to the group's cohesiveness and efficiency.

In terms of the example I made, I pointed out that a very religious blonde Christian would be no more likely to be hired than a woman in a burqua, and that a Ukrainian with fractured English would be as challenged as an Iranian.

In terms of immigration, the entire reason for the existence of the program is economic. Why, then, would we not recruit the immigrants who are most economically successful? That these immigrants also tend to be from cultures most similar to Canada's is a huge bonus, imho, since I like our culture a lot more than I do the cultures of the majority of our source countries.

Your problem is that you seem to think that only wasp type immigrants are successful, and you simply choose to ignore any data that disputes that assumption.
The world is becoming a smaller place and you you need to adapt or be left behind.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 10, 2017, 10:28:31 pm
Your problem is that you seem to think that only wasp type immigrants are successful, and you simply choose to ignore any data that disputes that assumption.
The world is becoming a smaller place and you you need to adapt or be left behind.

I ignore data that disputes that? Like what? The data I'm quoting comes from Canada's immigration department, which echoes a similar study done ten years earlier. If you're asking me to 'adapt' to stupid ideas put out by people who don't bother to support them with logic or facts, then no. Ain't happening.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Omni on September 10, 2017, 10:34:47 pm
I ignore data that disputes that? Like what? The data I'm quoting comes from Canada's immigration department, which echoes a similar study done ten years earlier. If you're asking me to 'adapt' to stupid ideas put out by people who don't bother to support them with logic or facts, then no. Ain't happening.

Most of your data comes from places like the Fraser Institute and other sites that are equally right wing biased. Adapt away from that? I doubt it.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on September 11, 2017, 06:38:38 am
Most of your data comes from places like the Fraser Institute and other sites that are equally right wing biased. Adapt away from that? I doubt it.

I see there being 3 fuzzy levels of sources:

1. Sources that strive, ostensibly, for objectivity but will fail because humans.  Newspapers and network TV news comes to mind.
2. Sources that have a clear opinion and more visible bias but still will avoid posting falsehoods.  Cable news and interest groups come to mind, such as Fraser.
3. Sources that publish falsehoods to get attention.  Most of these are web sites, or web TV like InfoWars.

As such, I think you can analyze the information from #2 by addressing the facts posted.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: JMT on September 11, 2017, 07:27:16 am
I see there being 3 fuzzy levels of sources:

1. Sources that strive, ostensibly, for objectivity but will fail because humans.  Newspapers and network TV news comes to mind.
2. Sources that have a clear opinion and more visible bias but still will avoid posting falsehoods.  Cable news and interest groups come to mind, such as Fraser.
3. Sources that publish falsehoods to get attention.  Most of these are web sites, or web TV like InfoWars.

As such, I think you can analyze the information from #2 by addressing the facts posted.

It's my personal policy to just ignore what the Fraser institute says when it clashes with information from a reputable source.  They have a clear agenda. 
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on September 11, 2017, 08:09:37 am
It's my personal policy to just ignore what the Fraser institute says when it clashes with information from a reputable source.  They have a clear agenda.

Sure, but they do put facts out there.  There are left-wing think tanks too.  I think both need to be addressed.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 11, 2017, 08:35:24 am
Again, it's not racism. I'll acknowledge the results might have a  similar effect, but there isn't any intent to keep anyone of a particular race or ethnicity out of a group
Racism doesn't require intent, discrimination does. That's why I keep reminding you that they're different.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 11, 2017, 08:36:35 am
Sure, but they do put facts out there.  There are left-wing think tanks too.  I think both need to be addressed.
Think Tanks aren't a problem. **** poor methodology is.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on September 11, 2017, 09:04:02 am
Think Tanks aren't a problem. **** poor methodology is.

Ok.  In addressing facts, methodology is definitely in play.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: SirJohn on September 11, 2017, 11:29:08 am
Most of your data comes from places like the Fraser Institute and other sites that are equally right wing biased. Adapt away from that? I doubt it.

And yet the data presented is from the government of Canada, and you can't dispute it so are trying to obfuscate it.

Besides which my data only occasionally comes from the Fraser Institute. Mainly it comes from the mainstream media and government statistics. As for the Fraser Institute, they give numbers on programs which the mainly left wing academics won't ever bother to even look at, let alone the government. Same with the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: cybercoma on September 11, 2017, 12:17:16 pm
Let's be clear here. I've rarely seen people post raw data to these forums. I'd love to get my hands on some of the data sets that these "analysts" are using. What people post are executive summaries of researchers' analyses. Even when you post a Pew Poll and they're showing results, these are descriptive analyses that they've created from the raw data. It's not the data itself. These things almost always need to be contextualized with regards to their researchers' methodologies, including their data collection techniques and assumptions they make. This is why I'm very critical of a lot of The Fraser Institute's reports. If you dig into their methodologies you see they do a lot of things to inflate numbers (for example, taking the mean average property tax for a city and applying that to everyone living there as part of their "taxes" or estimating the amount of alcohol and tobacco people are buying to apply an "average" amount of excise taxes paid). It's sloppy work that doesn't pass academic rigour and that's why they're not publishing their results in academic journals.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on December 10, 2019, 07:02:28 am
I am hearing a lot of left intellectual discussion that deep dives into the question of diversity.

https://twitter.com/AshleyAFrawley/status/1204167204817842177?s=20
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: TimG on December 10, 2019, 08:14:38 am
I appear to have full rights to modify and delete posts on this thread. The mod needs to check the permissions.
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on December 10, 2019, 08:40:36 am
I appear to have full rights to modify and delete posts on this thread. The mod needs to check the permissions.

Well you better not do that to me or.... ***MICHAEL HARDNER LIES WITH DOGS***

[Edited]
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Michael Hardner on December 10, 2019, 08:40:51 am
^ joke &
Title: Re: Right/Left Identity Politics
Post by: Squidward von Squidderson on December 10, 2019, 10:02:13 am
I appear to have full rights to modify and delete posts on this thread. The mod needs to check the permissions.

Everyone can moderate their own threads they started.